Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/100

84 84 THE JOEDAN WATERSHED.

Ghor it takes a south-easterly course across the plain of Wady Fusail, and reaches the confluence with Wady el Humr, through Melahet Urnm 'Asein. As the Fusail deflects from the foot of the hills, it receives from them Wady el Makthayeh, Wady Abu Zerka, and Wady el War, also Birket Fusail and another fountain in the plain, amid aqueducts and ruins that denote the site of the ancient Herodian city of Phasaelis.

THE BASIN OF WADY EL 'AftjAH.

The shape of the margin of this basin may be compared almost to an ellipse or to a rhomboid, with the four sides bulging outwards, the two longer being on the north and south. The parallel inclination of the shorter sides in passing from the northern border southward, is slightly to the east. The eastern waterparting follows the course of the Jordan at a distance from the river of about one mile and a-quarter at the northern end, tapering to half-a-rnile at the southern end, where the basin has its outlet into the Jordan. This narrow ridge is about seven miles in length, and its summit being on a level with the Ghor, denotes its identity with that feature, from which it is only separated by the gradually declining course of the Wady el Mellahah, to join the 'Aujah, near the outlet of the basin into the Jordan, where the depression below the sea is 1,200 feet. The Ghor seems to be here about 400 feet higher.

The northern waterparting concurs with that of Wady el Humr as far as Merj Sia, and this part is described in the account of that basin. But it is prolonged further westward for about three miles so as to include Kh. Abu Felah. Here the western boundary begins, running south to Tell Asur (alt. 3,318 feet). From Merj Sia to Tell Asur, this basin impinges on the Mediterranean waterparting of Nahr el 'Auja. Southward of Tell Asur, the Mediterranean system trends south-west, and the boundary of this basin trends south-east, following the Koman road as far as Kubbet Kummamaneh