Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/83

67 WADY EL HAMAM. WADY FEJJAS. 67

extent. It is, however, of much interest, for it rises near Hattin, where the Crusaders suffered a decisive defeat ; and includes the site of Irbid, and also the biblical Magdala, now el Mejdel, where it falls into the sea.

A series of minor basins skirt the rest of the coast of the Sea of Galilee between Wady el Hamam and Wady Fejjas, which falls into the Jordan at the Jisr es Sidd. The only one at all notable is the Wady el Amis next to Wady el Hamam. For from Tiberias to Jisr es Sidd the basin of Wady Fejjas skirts the sea closely, and at a height which attains to 1,650 feet above its depressed surface, leaving only a steep and narrow margin furrowed by precipitous channels towards the shore. The level of the Sea of Galilee as deter- mined by the Survey is 682*5 feet below the level of the Mediterranean.

THE BASIN OF WADY FEJJAS.

The waterparting of the Jordan is thrust inward at the head of this basin, which is coterminous with the most easterly extension of the Mukutt'a at the Plain of Toron. It has however some length, in consequence of its oblique direction from north-west to south-east. On the south it is bounded by the more considerable basin of Wady Bireh, except towards the outfall into the Jordan at the Jisr es Sidd, where a few short secondary channels are interposed along the right bank of the Jordan between the out Calls of this wady and Wady Bireh. Among them is the Wady umm Walhan with a permanent stream falling from a height of 2,000 feet in a short distance. It falls into the Jordan on its right bank, about a mile above the junction of the Yarmuk on its left bank, where the depression of the valley below the level of the Mediterranean is 835 feet. About two miles lower down, the Jordan is crossed by the Jisr el Mujamia, on the road to the Yarmuk and Um Keis (Gadara).

THE BASIN OF WADY EL BIEEH.

The heads of this basin extend along the margin 'of the Mukutt'a between the villages of esh Shejerah and