To which of the tribes did the country through which we are now passing belong?

The question about the river Kanah, that constituted the boundary between Ephraim and Manasseh, is not yet decided; but I think that this entire region belonged to Ephraim. The watercourses that cut across the plain from the eastern mountains are laid down, even in our best maps, very much at random, and must continue to be unreliable until corrected by the surveys of the Palestine Exploration Fund. As the 'Aujeh is quite too far south to be the Kanah of Joshua, the next river north of it, the Fâlik, may be the one that separated the two tribes. The name itself may suggest the idea of separation, or that which divides. But without attaching importance to this verbal hint, this river would seem to constitute a reasonable boundary between the two tribes. It starts with the fountains of Nâblus, drains the hills of Samaria, and receives numberless tributaries from north and south, and enters the sea midway between Jaffa and Cæsarea. Ephraim and Manasseh were "a great people;" had more than one "lot" assigned to them; and a large part of what in after-times constituted the Kingdom of Samaria belonged to them. Their territory appears to have extended quite across the country from the Jordan to the sea, and a long way also northwards; for they met together in Asher, which must have been somewhere about Carmel. It is utterly impossible, however, to lay down the boundaries of these tribes; and their cities were strangely intermingled, especially in the plain of Esdraelon, as appears from the sixteenth and seventeenth chapters of Joshua.

A large part of their mountains seem to have been covered with forests in the time of Joshua; for, in answer to their complaint, he said, "If thou be a great people, then get thee up to the wood country, and cut down for thyself;" and again, "Thou art a great people, and hast great power: thou shalt not have one lot only but the mountain shall be thine; for it is a wood, and thou shalt cut it down."

The word translated wood is y'ar, and the Arabic w'ar is the same, and for the same thing. Many of these y'ars are mentioned

1 1 Josh. xvii. 17, 18.

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in the Bible, and some of them still exist-rough, rocky regions, overgrown with brushwood and small trees. I was reminded of these and other Biblical matters during a lonely ride from Nâblus through the mountains to er Râs. For several miles I continued to meet parties of women carrying on their heads large loads of wood, which they were taking to Nâblus. I must have passed more than a hundred. They came in groups, staggering along up the mountain with their heavy burdens, and my sympathy was painfully enlisted in their behalf. The day was oppressively hot, and they had often to put down their loads and rest by the way-side. At length I came to an extensive w'ar, where other women were cutting down wood, and binding it into bundles similar to those I saw carried on the road. The sight sadly illustrated the severity of the sentence pronounced upon the Gibeonites and their associates, who also dwelt in those same regions. To "be hewers of wood and drawers of water" was indeed a dreadful doom.' Escaping from this tangled w'ar, I came to a village called 'Azzûn, where were large piles of those bundles of wood ready to be carried to market. I was here informed that a wedding was to be celebrated at the place in a few days, and that the expedition to Nâblus which I had encountered had for its object the purchase of the bride's trousseau with the money received for the wood—a novel method to achieve a result which must be accomplished in some way by all of the sex who purpose matrimony. The brides of 'Azzûn, it must be confessed, have to obtain their outfit by toil and drudgery which only the daughters of hewers of wood and drawers of water could sustain.

What is the trouble among the muleteers? They appear to have lost the way, and have scattered about, each one seeking a path for himself.

They are searching for a safe place to cross the main branch of the river Fâlik.

I do not see any river, but merely a meandering line of tall grass.

That is characteristic of all the streams that cut across this plain to the sea. It is not the water, but the treacherous mud

1 Josh. ix. 21.

concealed by the grass, that the muleteers are afraid of. They are safely over, however, and we may continue our ride. Several years ago I crossed this plain farther north, going from Cæsarea to Samaria. As we came near Abu Zabûrah, there called el Akhdar, I noticed some men ahead of us with loaded mules, which, after a little hesitation, they forced into the river, when down they all tumbled into the bottomless mire. Our men assisted to cut the ropes and extricate the poor beasts from their dangerous situation. Going some distance down the stream, we found a place entirely covered with thick reeds and grass, which the muleteers broke and trampled down, so as to form a practical causeway, over which we crossed without difficulty. We shall come to that river farther on; but Abd Allah intends to keep to the west, along the sandy ridge, and thus avoid those perplexing watercourses in this soft plain. Somewhere in this neighborhood must have been a station called Bethar, mentioned in one Itinerary as sixteen miles from Cæsarea; and there is a ruin called Barîn some distance east of our road which may mark the site of Bethar, but I know nothing about it.

I notice a very striking difference between this western side of the plain and that on the east: here we have no villages, while there the hill-sides are dotted with them.

You observe also that the width of the plain differs considerably in different parts, according as the foot-hills project into it or recede from it. But the plain itself is everywhere extremely fertile, and now clothed with most promising crops of wheat and barley, and richly garnished with an endless variety of gay flowers. What may be the breadth of the plain?

The average width is about four miles. Once I crossed it from the oak-clad glades south-east of Cæsarea to Bâkah, where I spent two nights and a quiet Sabbath. You can just see the village far away to the north-east. During my stay at Bâkah I filled several pages of my note-book with the names of villages and ruined sites in that neighborhood; but the only one that seemed Biblical was Jett, a place about two miles to the south of Bâkah. There was a Gath-rimmon in the tribe of Manasseh that was given to the Levites; and as that district probably belonged to Manasseh, it is pos

1 1 Josh. xxi. 25.

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sible that this village occupies that ancient site. The mountains on both sides of the road from Bâkah to Samaria are crowded with villages, and equally so the country to the north, quite out to the plain of Esdraelon. The chalky marl-hills of Samaria are clothed with splendid olive - groves and fig- orchards, and are even now thickly inhabited by an industrious though turbulent and fanatical people.

Salîm comes up to say that the country from this to Cæsarea is full of robbers, and he advises that, after we cross Abu Zabûrah, which is a short distance ahead, we all keep together for mutual protection. This we can well afford to do, since there is nothing of special interest to call us aside in any direction.

The sandy downs, with their pine bushes, are falling back towards the sea, giving place to a firmer soil, upon which stand here and there venerable oak-trees, like patriarchs of by-gone generations left alone in the wilderness.

They are the beginning of the largest and most impressive oak forest in western Palestine. It extends northwards to the eastern base of Carmel, and, with slight interruptions, it continues along the western slopes of Galilee quite to the lofty Jermŭk, west of Safet. I have spent many days in wandering through those vast oak glades.

The scenery is becoming quite park-like, and very pretty. The trees are all of one kind, and apparently very old.

The Arabic name for this species of oak is sindiân—a large evergreen-tree, whose botanical name is quercus pseudo-coccifera. There are other varieties of the oak interspersed occasionally with these, but the prevailing tree everywhere is the noble, venerable, and solemn sindiân.

We have been in the saddle about eight hours, and I hope our day's ride is nearly over.

And so it is; for here we are at the margin of the marsh of the Zerka, the Crocodile River, and in half an hour we shall reach. Tawâhîn ez Zerka-the mills of the Zerka-near the sea-shore, where alone we can encamp safely in this nest of robbers. Cæsarea is on our left, and we shall pass between it and this marsh northwards through the vast quarries of the ancient city to our camping-ground at the mills.

Tawâhîn ez Zerka, April 8th. Evening.

As the main object of this detour to Cæsarea and Dor was to visit a part of the Holy Land which we should not otherwise see, I wish to extend my acquaintance with the surrounding country as far as possible.

For that purpose no better position can be found than our present camp. It is, in fact, the centre of a region of great interest, both historic and Biblical. This Crocodile River, with its marshes and tributary brooks, has ever had a peculiar fascination about it, occasioned partly by the feeling of insecurity which always attends its exploration, and in part by its own unique character. On one