were enabled to develop their own character and institutions
without much interference from without. Inaccessible from the sea, and
surrounded, like the Swiss, by the natural fortifications of their hills,
like the Swiss they were also protected by their poverty from spoilers.
But being at the point of contact of three continents, they had (like the
Mahommedans afterwards) great facilities for communicating their religious
ideas to other nations.

Palestine is so small a country that from many points the whole of it may
be overlooked[339]. Toward the east, from all points, may be seen the high
plateau of Moab and the mountains of Gilead. Snow-capped Hermon is always
visible on the north. In the heart of the land rises the beautiful
mountain Tabor, clothed with vegetation to its summit. It is almost a
perfect cone, and commands the most interesting view in all directions.
From its top, to which you ascend from Nazareth by a path which Jesus may
have trod, you see to the northeast the lofty chain of Hermon (Jebel es
Sheikh = the Captain) rising into the blue sky to the height of ten
thousand feet, covered with eternal snow. West of this appears the chain
of Lebanon. At the foot of Tabor the plain of Esdraelon extends northerly,
dotted with hills, and animated with the camps of the Arabs[340]. The Lake
of Galilee gleams, a silver line, on the east, with Bashan and the
mountains of Gilead in the distance, and farther to the southeast the
great plateau of Moab rises like a mountain wall beyond the Jordan. The
valley of the Jordan itself, sunk far below the level of the
Mediterranean, is out of sight in its deep valley; nor is anything seen of
the Dead Sea. To the northwest rises rocky Carmel, overhanging the Bay of
Accha (or Acre), on the Mediterranean.

The whole country stands high. Hebron, at the south, is three thousand
feet above the level of the sea; Jerusalem is twenty-six hundred; the
Mount of Olives, twenty-seven hundred; and Ebal and Gerizim in Samaria,
the same. The valley in which Nazareth stands is eight hundred and twenty
feet above the sea; that at the foot of Tabor, four hundred and
thirty-nine; while the summit of Tabor itself is seventeen hundred and
fifty. From Judaea the land plunges downward very rapidly toward the east
into the valley of Jordan. The surface of Lake Galilee is already five
hundred and thirty-five feet below that of the Mediterranean, and that of
the Dead Sea is five hundred feet lower do