Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/27

11 THE BASIN OF NAHE KASIMIYEH. 11

has a length of about six miles. Further east another valley divides the 'Aizakaneh from the waterparting of the basin.

On the west of the Hajeir, the southern margin of the Kasimiyeh basin contains several villages ; and some small tributaries cut their way to the main stream through its high and rocky banks. One of the streams runs parallel to the waterparting by two channels for some distance.

The basin of the Kasimiyeh has been corrected as follows : The Hajeir is found to rise near el-Jumeijmeh, instead of at Aitheran. It is the Selukieh (Seluky), a branch of Hajeir which carries the basin of the Kasimiyeh so far south as Marun-er-Eas. West of Wady Hajeir the basin is deprived of a considerable area reaching south in former maps beyond Ter Zibna (now Teir Zinbeh), the new survey having discovered that this tract belongs to the Hubeishiyeh basin, which has its outfall into the sea, between the mouth of the Kasimiyeh and the city of Tyre.

Another geographical explanation is necessary before proceeding further. The basins of the Mediterranean Slope may be divided into two classes. Those of the first class are coterminous with the Jordan Basin. The second class basins are separated from the Jordan by the interposition of the upper parts of first class basins. This remark bears especially on the structure of the country which includes Tyre and Acre on its coast. In that part it will be found that only four consecu- tive basins in the interior divide the Kasimiyeh (or Litany) from the Mukutt'a (or Kishon) Basin. The four are the Hubeishiyeh, Ezziyeh, Kurn, and N'arnein ; although there are about 30 distinct outfalls along the coast within this area. The Hubeishiyeh is reckoned among the first class basins, although it is divided from the Jordan Basin by the southern extension of the Kasimiyeh. But the latter is an exceptional case, for it conforms rather with the upper part of the first class basins of the Jordan's Western Slope, than with similar features on the. Mediterranean Slope.* The second class


 * See pages 186, 187.