A wooden cross stands in the Jordan, on the spot where our Lord was baptized, the depth of which, when the water is highest, reaches to the neck of a tall man, and, when lowest, to the breast. The river is here about as broad as a man can throw a stone with a sling. A stone bridge, raised on arches, reaches from the bank of the river to the cross, where people bathe. Arculf swam backwards and forwards in the water. A little church stands at the brink of the water, on the spot where our Lord is said to have laid his clothes when he entered the river. On the higher ground is a large monastery of monks, and a church dedicated to St. John. Arculf found the waters of the Jordan of a yellowish milky colour, and observed that they preserved this colour to a considerable distance, after they flowed into the Dead Sea, where he also witnessed the way in which salt was obtained from the waters of the latter. In another excursion, Arculf visited the spot at the foot of Mount Libanus where the Jordan has its rise from two fountains, which are named Jor and Dan, the waters of which uniting, take the name of Jordan; and he went round the greater part of the Sea of Galilee, called also the Lake of Gennesareth, and the Sea of Tiberias, which is surrounded by thick woods, and is a hundred and forty stadia in length. The waters are sweet, and fit to drink; for it receives no mud, or other coarse substance, from any marshy pools, but is surrounded on all sides by a sandy shore. Arculf also travelled over the country of Samaria, and visited the town called in Hebrew Sichem, but by the Greeks and Latins Sicima, and now more usually Sichar. Here, without the walls, he saw a cruciform church, in the centre of which is the well of Jacob, where our Saviour met the Samaritan woman. Arculf, who drank of the water, estimated its depth at forty cubits. He also saw in the wilderness a clear fountain, protected with a covering of masonry, at which it is reported John the Baptist used to drink. He likewise saw a very small species of locust, the bodies of which are slender and short, about the size of a finger; and, because they make short leaps like frogs, they are easily caught among the grass. When boiled in oil, they form a poor sort of food. In the same desert he saw trees with broad round leaves of a milky colour, with the savour of honey, which are naturally fragile, and, after being bruised with the hand, are eaten; and this is the wild honey found in the woods. He further saw, on this side of the Sea of Galilee, to the north of the city of Tiberias, the place where our Lord blessed the loaves and fishes, a grassy and level plain, which has never been ploughed since that event, and shows no traces of buildings, except a few columns round the fountain where, as they say, those persons drank after they had eaten their fill.