ion and depression.
This will give a rough idea of the conformation of Southern Palestine.
On the west is the Mediterranean Sea. Skirting the sea are a series of
sand dunes, beyond which comes the Coastal Plain. Together, these form
the first depressed strip, averaging about 15 miles in width.
Northwards, it tapers to a point where the mountains reach the sea at
Cape Carmel. Beyond the Coastal Plain is the range of mountains on which
stands Jerusalem, the mountains of Samaria and of Judaea, rising to a
height of about 3,000 feet above the level of the sea. On the eastern
side of these mountains is a steep drop to the Valley of the Jordan and
the Dead Sea, the level of the latter being nearly 1,300 feet below the
level of the Mediterranean, and more than 4,000 feet below the summit of
the adjoining Mount of Olives. Beyond the Jordan valley the country
rises again abruptly into the hills of Moab or Eastern Palestine. Beyond
lies the waterless desert.

Before entering into details, let us imagine ourselves to be standing
on one of the mountains round about Jerusalem.[1] Away to the north,
Mount Carmel rises abruptly from the sea. Thence the chain of Carmel
runs S.S.E. for some 20 miles, dividing the Coastal Plain from the Plain
of Esdraelon. About Dothan and Tul Keram it merges in the range
comprising the mountains of Samaria and Judaea, which range runs north
and south through the land like the backbone of a fish, with steep
spurs, like ribs, thrown out on either side towards the Coastal Plain
and the Jordan Valley. Westwards, we look down upon the cultivated
plain, and across it to the golden belt of sand dunes, tapering like the
waist of an hour-glass where the olive plain touches the sea at Jaffa;
beyond, lies the deep blue of the Mediterranean. Eastwards is a sheer
abyss falling into the Jordan Valley, where that river, like a silver
thread, winds its way along until it falls into the Dead Sea. Beyond, as
if across a fifteen-mile moat, rise abruptly the mountains of Moab. The
map of Palestine might be aptly compared to a bridge marker. The
horizontal line is the plain of Esdraelon. In vertical columns "below
the line" lie the strips of the country which we have just described.
"Above the line" are the mountains of Lebanon, Tabor and Hermon, Galilee
and the Sea of Tiberias, and the valleys and rivers of Damascus.

Let us consider these zones in greater detail, more especially with
regard to their influence on war. The