Occasionally, away to our right, between the desolate, dusty, sulphurous-looking hills, we caught a momentary glimpse of the emerald sheen of the Dead Sea, while away on our left on the edge of the valley, stood out the Mount of Temptation. [Illustration: THE JERUSALEM-JERICHO ROAD] [Illustration: NEAR THE WADI KELT (See page 95)] The moment we got down to the Jordan Valley (or Ghor, as the Arabs call it) the real trials of the men began. The heat was intense, and the going became very heavy, for we had no longer a good metalled road on which to march. Dust lay a foot deep on the path; it was exceedingly fine and looked like the best powdered cement. As the men marched clouds of it arose and choked them, while their feet were actually sucked down at each step, and an effort had to be made to draw the foot out again, as if some devil were below, pulling at the sole of the boot. The sixteen platoons forming the battalion marched well apart in order to evade as much of this blinding, choking, sulphurous dust as possible. Jericho, the city of the Palms, lay a little to our right. We passed its outskirts and halted for a rest under Old Jericho, the walls of which the Bible tells us miraculously fell to Joshua's trumpets over 3,000 years ago. This was a thought which acted as a spur to every Jewish soldier, and although the march was a hard one and the worst of it had yet to be done, the men came through the ordeal triumphantly, and very few dropped out by the way. Those who did fall by the wayside were helped along by our Padre, the Rev. L. A. Falk, who gave up his horse to the footsore and carried the pack and rifle of the weary, thus cheering them along into Camp. This time it was the Priest who proved the Good Samaritan on the road to Jericho. Soon after we recommenced our march from under the walls of old Jericho a huge black column of fine dust, whose top was lost in the Heavens, arose in front of us and gyrated slowly and gracefully as our vanguard, leading us onward to our bivouac on the banks of a cool and pleasant brook, where it vanished. I felt that this was a good omen for our success in the Jordan Valley, for it was a case of the Children of Israel being led once more by a pillar of cloud. The Headquarters of the Australian Mounted Division was close beside our bivouac, and here I had a very welcome breakfast with Major-General H. W. Hodgson, its capable and genial Commander. The General told me that he would review the battalion on the following afternoon, on its march out to the new camping ground on the Auja. Next morning, while the men were resting and refreshing themselves on the banks of the Nueiameh (for so the cool stream was named), I rode down the Valley to the eastward of Jericho, accompanied by our Padre.