the river water, which is generally turgid, from getting direct access to the water of the wells. In the selection of the sites, as well as in the execution of the work, there has, therefore, been displayed both judgment and skill; while it must have been a work requiring both strength and perseverance to hollow out of the hard limestone rock, of which this region is formed, wells of such depth and excellence of construction. Captain Conder states that the depth of the larger well is over 45 feet, lined with rings of masonry to a depth of 28 feet, and he made a discovery which, as he remarks, was rather disappointing, namely, that the masonry is not very ancient. Fifteen courses down, on the south side of the large well, he found a stone with an inscription in Arabic on a tablet dated 505 a.h., that is, in the twelfth century.[1] This discovery, however, does not throw any doubt on the antiquity of the wells themselves, but may only refer to the date of their restoration from a state of previous dilapidation.
Beersheba and its surroundings have been so often described that it is not my intention to dwell further on this most interesting locality. It was a reward of many a day's toil to stand on the spot where dwelt the Father of the Faithful; to drink of the same well of which he drank; and to look upon the same scenes which, day after day for several years of his eventful life, met his gaze. The history of the Patriarch becomes on this spot a vivid reality.
We had now reached the southern margin of the tract included in the Ordnance Survey Map of Western Palestine.[2] All the way between Tel-el-Milh and Bir es Seba (Beersheba) the country is strewn with ruins of walls and foundations of buildings, showing how thickly it was once inhabited. Now, the land is "desolate, almost without inhabitant;" for during the fourteen miles of march between these places, we only twice fell in with human beings: on one occasion a Bedawin; on the other, fellahin ploughing with their camels.
The pressure on our time, the expense consequent on our detention in The Ghôr, and prospective detention in Gaza, forbade the idea of the usual Sunday rest; we therefore pressed on for another day's march to Tel Abu Hareireh, a distance of about fifteen miles. The country we traversed consisted of an undulating plain, over the sides and hollows of
