The spring itself, 83° F. in temperature, comes out from under a great boulder, and the water streams over a steep cliff, the course being marked by a fringe of vegetation beside the cascade. There is a little sloping plateau with remains of a square drystone platform, not unlike an altar; and round the spring there is a cane-brake and thicket of Solanum and prickly bushes, with the ’Osher trees, or “apples of Sodom,” growing above, the fruit of which consists chiefly of skin and white pith, but is hollow within, while the leaves of the tree are thick and fleshy. Among these thickets the beautiful black grackles, with gold-tipped wings, with the bulbuls, and hopping thrushes, were the only living things visible. The view extended across the calm blue sea to the great eastern precipices. The broad tongue of the Lisân ran out only some few feet above the water-level, and high above, the great Castle of Kerak, with its towers and bastions, stood distinct and white on its rocky scarps, taking one back in imagination to the middle ages. On the south the scene was equally grand. The long western beach of the sea stretched away with a succession of little white capes running out into the blue water, and, above this, the great cliffs--bastion beyond bastion of castellated crags divided by great gorges, succeeded one another. A steep slope of débris lay at their feet, and beneath this was a second line of white terrace--the Siddim cliffs, which are shores of a former lake. A dark, square, rocky promontory was capped by a building conspicuous against the sky-line, being part of the fortress of Masada, and yet farther off the salt mountain of Usdûm, and the blue range of the Arabah closed the view, but were half hidden by the smoke of burning reeds in the marshes south of the lake. Descending six hundred feet from the spring, by the ruins of former gardens, we rode northwards for about half a mile, and then, leaving our horses at a spot where the boulders were too rough to allow them a footing, we toiled along the shore for two and a half miles, in search of the sulphur springs discovered by Dr. Tristram. Scrambling over cliffs, or walking in the water round promontories, we reached the place; but the season had brought only a little rain to this part of the desert, and the springs were dry, being only recognisable by the strong local smell of the sulphur. Along this desolate shore we found the pickled bodies of fish from Jordan, and here and there a palm stem, carried over from the east, while in the hollows of the rocks we noticed the waves splashing up, leaving little pools which dried rapidly, and made a white bed of crystalline salt on the stones.