Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/257

241 THE MOUNTAINS OF JUP-ffiA. 241

more than 2,000 feet above the sea, up to its eastern edge in the Middle Eange. It contains Jerusalem and Bethlehem, with several villages and cultivated grounds, besides many ruined sites that are the remnants of a much larger popula- tion. Between the Middle and Eastern Kanges, and below the latter to the foot of the mountains, not a village is to be found, and the only settled habitation is the fortified Greek Convent of Mar Saba. The high lateral valleys on the east of the main waterparting that have been traced from the north of Samaria up to Wady el Ain and the northern boundary of this group, are continued southward from Deir Diwan, to Jeba, Hizmeh, Anata, and el 'Aisawiyeh to Jerusalem. But the lateral character of the valleys on the Eastern Plateau is much less developed, than it is in the valleys of the Western Plateau, from Bireh to Bethlehem. South of Bethlehem, the lateral valleys are found again chiefly on the eastern side of the range as far as Hulhul ; when they are once more transferred to the other side, and are taken up by the great Wady el Khulil and its parallel affluents.

The Hill Country of Judah, or the Hebron Group.

The eastern boundary of this mountain system is defined by the shores of the Dead Sea. On the south the subject cannot for the present be discussed owing to the limits of the Survey. On the west the boundary has been already indi- cated southward from Wady Surar along the Wady en Najil and Wady es Sur. South of the head of the latter wady, and as far as Beit Auwa, there might be some doubt about the continuity of the meridional division between the foot of the Mountains of Judah, and the Lowland Hills of the Shephelah, as the hill drawing of the Survey is not so expressive or accentuated as it might be. But here the evidence of Dr. Robinson removes all hesitation as far south as Tell Beit Mirsim and Burj el Beiyarah.* Indeed the

steep ascent of the higher ridge soon commences." "Bib. Res." ii, 70.
 * He remarks that " Idhna lies at the foot of the mountains, where the