Thence we descended into a glen of blazing white stone, without any verdure, in which were a diversity of paths, and a petty runlet of water issuing from the ground, but soon showing only stagnant green pools and mud, with frogs in abundance, then evaporated altogether. Near this, Salim was taken with vomiting and purging, and was hardly able to remain on his horse; the dragoman also fainting and giddy, and the rest frightened with the terrors of expected cholera. Our guide wanted to desert us and return home. The muleteers and luggage had taken another road, but after a time we met again. Moving on, the ground became a gradual rise, and a stream coming down it toward us, became clearer as we ascended, and fruit-trees were rather numerous. Under some fig-trees the kawwas laid himself down, and we stayed there three hours with him; water was poured over his head to obviate fever, and I administered some pills. During the interval I found some sculptured stones with Hebrew inscriptions, which I have elsewhere described, and took pains to decipher the words, but without much result. They were lying in a ploughed field by the roadside. We were now entering on classic ground of the Talmudists, and upon a precipice above us, upon wide table-ground, was the village of _Jish_, the Giscala of Josephus. When evening brought coolness, we proceeded towards Safed. A peasant passing us was carrying home his plough upon his shoulder, except the iron share, which his little daughter, of two or three years old, carried on her head. Some of our horses were so stung by flies that the blood flowed to the stones under their feet as they went along. There were traces of ancient pavement along the road, and cavern holes in chalk-rock sides. Then traversing a few miles of dark volcanic stone we neared a crater in the ground, whose gloomy aspect was fully in keeping with the destruction which such a phenomenon bespeaks as having occurred--silent as the death it produced, and void of all pleasurable features, of wild flowers, or even the thorns of nature. The whole vicinity bore traces of the earthquakes that have often occurred there, especially that of 1837. After this a glorious prospect burst upon us of Safed, "set upon a hill," and the gloomy hill of Jarmuk beside it. Tabor also in view far in advance, throwing a vast shadow of late afternoon-time over other hills, and glimpses of the lake Tiberias. Encamped on our former site among the great old olive-trees north of the town. Some Jewesses gleaning olives from the ground were frightened away. Visitors were out at once to welcome us in English, Arabic, and Judisch, (Jewish-German.) We were surrounded by fair and rosy complexions of Jews, the effect of the pure bracing air of the mountain.