gh seemingly to a less
extent. But of violent, or catastrophic, change there is no trace. Even
the volcanic outbursts have flowed in even sheets over the old land
surface; and the long lines of the horizontal terraces which remain,
testify to the geological insignificance of such earthquakes as have
taken place. It is, indeed, possible that the original formation of the
valley may have been determined by the well-known fault, along which the
western rocks are relatively depressed and the eastern elevated. But,
whether that fault was effected slowly or quickly, and whenever it came
into existence, the excavation of the valley to its present width, no
less than the sculpturing of its steep walls and of the innumerable deep
ravines which score them down to the very bottom, are indubitably due
to the operation of rain and streams, during an enormous length of
time, without interruption or disturbance of any magnitude. The alluvial
deposits which have been mentioned are continued into the lateral
ravines, and have more or less filled them. But, since the waters have
been lowered, these deposits have been cut down to great depths, and are
still being excavated by the present temporary, or permanent, streams.
Hence, it follows, that all these ravines must have existed before
the time at which the valley was occupied by the great mere. This fact
acquires a peculiar importance when we proceed to consider the grounds
for the conclusion that the old Palestinian mere attained its highest
level in the cold period of the pleistocene epoch. It is well known
that glaciers formerly came low down on the flanks of Lebanon and
Antilebanon; indeed, the old moraines are the haunts of the few
survivors of the famous cedars. This implies a perennial snowcap of
great extent on Hermon; therefore, a vastly greater supply of water to
the sources of the Jordan which rise on its flanks; and, in addition,
such a total change in the general climate, that the innumerable Wadys,
now traversed only by occasional storm torrents, must have been occupied
by perennial streams. All this involves a lower annual temperature and
a moist and rainy atmosphere. If such a change of meteorological
conditions could be effected now, when the loss by evaporation from the
surface of the Dead Sea salt-pan balances all the gain from the Jordan
and other streams, the scale would be turned in the other direction. The
waters of the Dead Sea would become diluted; its level would