"And not two miles from Suweim we found a little volcano of very recent date geologically, and an eruption may have wrought havoc in a town located near Suweim." [Footnote 41: "Palestine and Its Transformation."] [Footnote 42: Genesis 13:10.] In one part of the valley he also found a cave among the mountains, hewn out of the limestone above a spring. Now turn to your Bible, Genesis 9:30: "And Lot went up out of Zoar and dwelt in the mountain, in a cave, he and his two daughters." In short, the geography of the region--such is the conclusion of Professor Huntington's careful study--"supplies all the elements of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah in exactly the location where the Biblical account would lead one to expect them." But the native Arab goes further. Not far from the borders of the Dead Sea is a mountain of salt called Jebel Usdem, which "the early and later rains" in the course of ages have dissolved into many fantastic shapes. Among these strange figures is a pillar tapering toward the top, on which is a wide cap of stone, such as that shown on page 60 and such as are often seen on detached and pillared rocks. But this gaunt remnant of grisly gray, although it is still obviously a part of the mountain and cannot be less than forty feet high, your Arab friend insists was once the wife of Lot! HIDE AND SEEK IN THE LIBRARY If you were hunting for mountain lakes where would you expect to find the most, in high mountains or in low? Rivers sometimes make lakes by using the same stuff the small boys do, just plain mud. Look at Lake Pontchartrain in the map of Louisiana and you can see one of the ways in which this is done. Remember that all the land around this lake is part of the delta of the Mississippi. The river deposits have simply enclosed a portion of the shallow sea. Or--this is another way in which rivers make lakes by building mud walls--a river emptying at right angles into a narrow gulf may build a dam clear across it. The rich Imperial Valley of southern California was cut off from the Gulf of California in this way. Look at the map and you can see just how this was done. One of the puzzles about mountain lakes is how frogs got into them. The frogs never climbed up there, you may be sure. Muir thinks maybe the ducks did it. How do you suppose? See if you can imagine and then see what Muir says about it.[43] [Footnote 43: "The Mountains of California."] In connection with what was said about lakes playing they are oceans--not these little mountain lakes, of course, but great big lakes--you will be interested in what Lord Bryce says in his "Travels in South America" about why lakes may even look larger than the ocean.