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213 JEBEL DUHY RANGE. 213

hundreds were drowned in a swollen stream, thus repeating an incident of Sisera's defeat.

A plateau on the east of Jebel Duhy embraces the remainder of this upland group. It is intersected almost diagonally by a winding wady named Wady Dabu and Wady Yebla after ruined sites on its banks. The wady rises on the north- west at Dabu near Tumrah, and it falls to the south-east where the wady emerges as Wady el 'Esh-sheh from the lofty banks of the plateau on to the Ghor. (2.) The northern part of the plateau is a slightly winding range, extending between Tumrah and the very prominent summit of Kaukab el Hawa, crowned by the vast remains of the Crusaders' great Castle of Belvoir. The general course of the range is parallel with the Wady el Bireh at its base, but while the wady descends to 900 feet below the sea level, the range rises gradually to 975 feet above the same datum line. The fall from the one to the other towards the east, or from the eastern wall of the fortress to the Ghor at its foot, is quite abrupt, the edge of the low plain being within the horizontal distance of a mile from the overhanging summit. The fall to Wady Bireh on the north, is broken by a terrace on which is the village of el Bireh (alt. 546 feet), the bottom of the great gorge being about 1,000 feet lower. The terrace widens out towards Denna and is terminated by a bend of the range towards the same place, from which a watercourse descends by Wady Hammud to Wady Bireh. Between Wady Hammud and the Plain of Esdraelon, the northern range of this group of hills descends to Wady Bireh, a broad and open down. Towards the south and south-west the fall varies. From Kaukab el Hawa there is a direct drop to the Wady el 'Esh-sheh, and its continuation westward as Wady Kharrar. (3.) This valley forms the first step, terrace or raised trough, above the Ghor and the Valley of Jezreel. On the outer edge of the trough is Murussus (alt. 323 feet). Denudation has reduced the trough within this edge to an altitude of 10 feet only at Zebu. This, however, represents a material difference between the direct ascent to

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