Page:An Introduction to the Survey of Western Palestine.djvu/46

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30
THE MEDITERRANEAN WATERSHED.

the central and western range for about four miles, breaks through the western range to reach the sea at Athlit. From the gap of Wady Shellaleh, the western range skirts the Wady el Ain and descends to the plain at the village of et Tireh.

The eastern slope of Carmel presents a similar parallelism, chiefly displayed in the Khallet or Ravine of en Nury, which divides an outer ridge from the central one, for a distance of nearly three miles, between Ras ez Zelâkah and Jebel 'Akkara. Towards the south the outer ridge is found below Esfia, between Kh. esh Shelkiyeh and the Wady esh Shomariyeh. North of Ras ez Zelakah, the outer ridge descends by Tell Abu Mudauwar, and encloses numerous channels between it and the central range. These channels unite before they break through the outer range to reach the sea through Nahr el Mantneh, near Haifa. Dr. John Wilson noticed this feature as exhibiting "a lateral gash in the hill, running in the direction of the promontory, which is of some magnitude. It is here that the best cultivated fields occur. [1]


The Basins of Nahr ed Dufleh and Nahr ez Zerka.

There are two minor basins between the southern base of Mount Carmel and the first class basin of Nahr el Mefjir. These have their outlets by Nahr ed Dufleh, on the south of Tanturah, the biblical Dor of Manasseh; and by Nahr ez Zerka, which is identified with the Crocodile River[2] of Pliny, and the Shihor Libnath of the Bible. Together they drain the principal part of the hilly tract now called Belad er Ruhah.,

"The Basin of Nahr ed Dufleh."

Three permanent streams with tributary wadys drain the head of the Nahr ed Dufleh, between the villages of Daliet er Ruhah and Umm et Tût; and between Umm et Tût and


  1. Lands of the Bible, ii, 242.
  2. "See" Macgregor's "Rob Roy on the Jordan," 6th edit., p. 387, "note."