Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/178

162 162 THE PLAINS OF THE JORDAN.

1. Tlie Plain of Phasaelis,

The Wady Abu Sidreh was chosen to define the southern limit of the Samaritan Gorge, because it is a line that lies distinct upon the ground, and is equally clear upon the map. But the waterparting on the north of this wady should be regarded as the actual limit, although it may not be so easy to trace. The preference for the waterparting is due to natural features connected with the widening of this part of the Ghor. These occur in the form of a series of parallel valleys, commencing on the south of the range that bounds the Maleh Basin on the south-west, and which has been shown to have a remarkable influence on that basin, and also on the Samaritan Gorge. These valleys are (1) the Wady el Bukei'a. (2) the Wady Far'ah, and (3) the Wady el Ifjim, Lakaska, or el Humr. They run in parallel courses through the hills into the Ghor, and, with a singular exception, enlarge the Ghor by the deep bays which run up from it into the hills, and form the mouths of these valleys.

The Wady Sidreh is the outlet of the first of the series, the Wady el Bukei'a, which runs at the base of the range that bounds the Maleh Basin on the south-west. The Wady el Bukei'a is, however, somewhat exceptional at both ends. At its head the Bukei'a is overlapped by the broad expansion of the sources of the next parallel valley which succeeds it on the south, the noted Wady Far'ah, the great highway be- tween Nablus and Trans-Jordan. At its outlet the Bukei'a takes a very curious and singular course ; for instead of gradually expanding into the wide plain, and so contributing to the surface of the Ghor, it contracts into a narrow, deep, and rocky chasm, which appears at first to be completely blocked at its lower end, while it really makes an abrupt and short bend nearly at right angles to its former south-westerly and straight course, and then winds about northward, north- east, and finally east, till it emerges from the hills to descend at once into the Zor, which here interrupts the Ghor altogether.

So little is there any obvious connection between the