These mountains were given to Gad in the allotment of Joshua and Eleazar. Surely at that time the prospect must have been much more pleasing than at present, or the Gadites would not have been so anxious to receive this district as a permanent possession. True, even now, a few narrow valleys, or wadies, show signs of great fertility, but the greater part is quite uninviting. Yet to the tourist there is much of interest in this region. My way to the Jordan lay over these mountains, especially that part known as the Jebel Ajlun. Sometimes it seemed impossible to proceed because of rocks and underbrush. The mountain sides were so steep in some places that we were barely able to climb them; many of the wadies, washed by winter torrents, were next to being impassable; and when our way led along the sides of precipitous slopes I shuddered to think of the consequences of a misstep upon the part of my horse. The course I had chosen through this East- Jordan country was an unusual one (as already noted)--one over which my dragoman had never gone, and one over which, he said, not one in a thousand tourists to Palestine ever asked to go,--a statement corroborated by the United States Consul at Jerusalem, who has written extensively on the trans-Jordanic highlands. This statement was not very encouraging to me, but I had set my heart on reaching the Jordan by this route, so simply said, "Lead on." Several times I feared I had made a serious mistake, but having come thus far I could not go back. After we had passed through the old cemetery our ascent was gradual until we reached the modern village of Suf, three miles northwest of Gerasa. Here we see "two women grinding at the mill." The mill consists of two circular stones about fourteen inches in diameter, the one stone rests upon the other, and the grain to be crushed between them is supplied by one of the women while the other turns the upper stone round and round, thus grinding the meal for the uninviting bread of their less inviting floor-table. This place has been suggested by Major Condor as the probable site of Mizpah in Gilead. A group of fine stone monuments, in ruins, is yet to be seen here. If this be the location of Mizpah then here is the place where Jacob and Laban made their covenant of lasting peace, and erected the "heap of witness" (Gen. 31:44-52), saying, "The Lord watch between me and thee when we are absent one from another." Then they parted, Laban going back to Mesopotamia and Jacob pressing on with anxious heart toward the near Jabbok and the farther lands of his estranged brother Esau. Inspired by the covenant at Mizpah, and with a desire to help others to establish covenants of peace, and to accept with cheerful resignation enforced separation from loved ones, a recent writer, Julia A. Baker, has written beautifully the following poem entitled "Mizpah":