Branching off from the northern portion of the mountains of Samaria, Carmel is a bold and grand promontory projecting into the sea. Running in a northwesterly direction, it is the boundary-line between the Plain of Sharon on the south and that of Phœnicia on the north. Rising 2000 feet above the sea, it is 18 miles long and five wide. Covered with evergreen oaks, it is appropriately called “The Fruitful Field.” As the type of natural beauty, Isaiah compares the returning glory of his nation to the “excellency of Carmel,”[517] while Amos predicts that “the top of Carmel shall wither,”[518] as descriptive of the utter ruin of his country. From the summit the eye rests upon one of the noblest landscapes in the world. To the west is that “great sea” seen by the prophet’s servant; to the south are the Mountains of Samaria; to the north the Hills of Nazareth; while to the east is the Plain of Esdraelon, stretching far away to the Jordan in vast undulations, and dotted with Gilboa, Little Hermon, and Mount Tabor. But the glory of Carmel is its sacred associations. In the darkest hour in Jewish history, when Jehovah’s altars were thrown down and his prophets slain, hither Elijah invited the priests of Baal to test by fire the superiority of their respective gods. The priests conceding the existence of Elijah’s God, the contest was to decide whether Jehovah or Baal should be the supreme divinity of the land. Chastened by the evils of a long drouth, the people were prepared for a procedure so extraordinary. Ahab, over whom the infamous Jezebel had gained the ascendency, was upon the throne of Israel; and, while lost to all the better feelings of woman’s nature, and irreclaimably abandoned to the worst forms of idolatry, there remained no hope in the case of the queen, yet such a divine interposition might act for good on the mind of the king.