400 THE HOLY LAND. 
^?x^' features, are well suited to the tales relate^ 
^ '-s>- -' concerning it by the inhabitants of the country. 
Erroneous in t r • • i 
Notions who all spcak of it With terror, seeming to 
oftHs'"^ shrink from the narrative of its deceitful allure- 
■^^^' ments and deadly influence. " Beautiful fruit," 
say they," grows upon its shores, which is no 
sooner touched, than it becomes dust and bitter 
ashes." In addition to its physical horrors, 
the region around is said to be more perilous, 
owing to the ferocious tribes wandering upon 
the shores of the lake, than any other part of 
the Holi/ Land. A passion for the marvellous 
has thus affixed, for ages, false characteristics 
to the sublimest associations of natural scenery 
in the whole world; for, although it be now 
known that the waters of this lake, instead of 
proving destructive of animal life, swarm with 
myriads oijishes ' ; that, instead of falling victims 
to its exhalations, certain hirds^ make it their 
(1) " About midnight, I heard a noise upon the lake. The 
Sethlehctnitcs told me, that it proceeded from legions of small fish, 
which come and leap about on the shore." De Chateaubriand's 
Travels, vol. I. p. 411. Land, 1811. 
(2) See Matmdrell's J ouTuey, p. 84. Oxf. 1721. There were many 
lakes where the same fable was related of birds falling dead in flying 
over them. A lake of this nature was called /^vernus, i. e. Aornus, 
without birds. Reland refutes the fable, as applied to the LmU^ 
Asphalt ites .• ''Quod verb quidam seribunt aves supra lacum hunc volantes 
neeari, nunc quidem certe experientia: repugnat." Pahsst. Illust. lib. i- 
oap. 38. Utr. 1714. 
