for quarrying stone on the old method, and certainly many of the cuttings were those of quarriers. There are the remains of what was apparently an old fortress at the eastern end of the Tell, but the most remarkable features are the numerous wine-presses, which number about thirty, some of them in an excellent state of preservation. There are also some tombs, but these are rare and scattered, which is to be accounted for by the fact that this was a Levitical city, within the limits of which no interment was allowed. There are numerous chips of stone, some apparently basaltic, and much broken pottery all over the Tell, and many flints, some of which were worked, have been discovered. While he was building his house, which is just under the Tell, Mr. Bergheim found a deep cistern about forty feet square, lined with small stones and covered with two coats of cement, which was hard and white; the walls were about two feet thick, and it seemed to have a niche in its eastern wall, as though it had at one time been used as a chapel. In the niche a cross was found, painted red, and beneath it a stone altar, which has been removed; but all this points to an early Christian occupation. Mr. Bergheim has since converted the cistern to its original use. He also found a curious idol in hard red pottery. The fellahin say that many of these “dolls,” as they call them, used to be picked up, and were given to the children as playthings. Flint instruments, earthenware weights, and rubbers in composition, for use in cementing cisterns, have been found in ploughing on the Tell, and near its southwest extremity a number of skeletons were discovered, apparently of persons slain in battle; one had a sword-cut on the skull. An aqueduct cut in the rock is also traceable along the hillside. Altogether the place is a good deal more interesting than it looks at first sight, and had its owner been an antiquary he would doubtless have had splendid opportunities of making a valuable collection. That the spot has always had a semi-sacred character in the eyes of the country people is evident from the traditions which attach to it. One is that the city of Noah stood upon the hill here, and that the deluge came from a place called Et Tannar, which is a cavity with an old well on the east slope of the hill. The modern name Abu Shusheh, or “Father of the Topknot,” is said to be derived from a dervish who prayed for rain in time of drought, and was told by a sand diviner that he would perish if it came. The water came out of the earth and formed a pool, into which he stepped and was drowned. The people, seeing only his topknot left, cried, “Ya Abu Shusheh” (O Father of the Topknot).