The Jordan is not navigable. Along its whole course it has no wharves, no boats, and no cities or villages of any account. It has numerous fords but no bridges of any size. The wooden bridge about six miles above the Dead Sea is a toll bridge, with fords above and below it. The people use it only when the river is high. At other times the caravans save the toll by passing through the fords. On its course from Galilee to the Dead Sea the river narrows and widens. Now it is a swift, black, sullen current flowing between ugly mud banks covered with refuse, now it comes close to the mountains which border the valley on either side, and down here at the Dead Sea it reaches a width of five hundred feet, being so shallow that you could almost wade across it. The water gathers the denudations of the mountains. It changes in colour from season to season, and in the spring spreads out in floods over the valley. It is said that the parting of the water in order that Joshua and the Israelites might pass over was when the river was at its highest. At this point in its course it is not a sweet water. It has gathered the salts from this arid country and is so full of organic matter that those who carry it home for baptisms have to boil and filter it to get rid of its disagreeable smell. I have several canteens which I filled myself from the stream, or rather with the water which I brought in wine bottles from the Jordan and had boiled and filtered before it was put into the cans. If I ever have a grandchild it shall be baptized with this water. I bought the canteens at the Jordan Hotel here at Jericho where they are kept on hand to be sold to the tourists and pilgrims. A vast number of them are carried away every year.