In four hours and a half, after having ascended the mountain on the S. side of the Wale, we reached a fine plain on its summit. All the country to the southward of the Wale, as far as the Wady Modjeb, is comprised under the appellation of El Koura, a term often applied in Syria to plains: El Koura is the “Plains of Moab” of the Scripture; the soil is very sandy, and not fertile. The Haouran black stone, or basalt, if it may be so called, is again met with here. The river El Wale rises at about three hours distance to the E. of the spot where we passed it, near which it takes a winding course to the south until it approaches the Modjeb, where it again turns westwards. The lower part of the river changes its name into that of Seyl Heydan (Arabic), which empties itself into the Modjeb at about two hours distant from the Dead sea, near the ruined place called Dar el Ryashe (Arabic). The Wale seems to be the same called Nahaliel in D’Anville’s map, but this name is unknown to the Arabs; its source is not so far northward as in the map. Between the Wady Zerka Mayn and the Wale is another small rivulet called Wady el Djebel (Arabic). At the end of six hours and a half we reached the banks of the Wady Modjeb, the Arnon of the Scriptures, which divides the [p.372] province of Belka from that of Kerek, as it formerly divided the small kingdoms of the Moabites and the Amorites. When at about one hour’s distance short of the Modjeb I was shewn to the N.E. of us, the ruins of Diban (Arabic), the ancient Dibon, situated in a low ground of the Koura. On the spot where we reached the high banks of the Modjeb are the ruins of a place called Akeb el Debs (Arabic). We followed, from thence, the top of the precipice at the foot of which the river flows, in an eastern direction, for a quarter of an hour, when we reached the ruins of Araayr (Arabic), the Aroer of the Scriptures, standing on the edge of the precipice; from hence a foot-path leads down to the river. In the Koura, about one hour to the west of Araayr, are some hillocks called Keszour el Besheir (Arabic). The view which the Modjeb presents is very striking: from the bottom, where the river runs through a narrow stripe of verdant level about forty yards across, the steep and barren banks arise to a great height, covered with immense blocks of stone which have rolled down from the upper strata, so that when viewed from above, the valley looks like a deep chasm, formed by some tremendous convulsion of the earth, into which there seems no possibility of descending to the bottom; the distance from the edge of one precipice to that of the opposite one, is about two miles in a straight line.