History of Phoenicia | Page 6

communicate with the next plain towards the north.[9]
Compared with Sharon the plain of Acre is unimportant and of small extent. It reaches about eight miles along the shore, from the foot of Carmel to the headland on which the town of Acre stands, and has a width between the shore and the hills of about six miles. Like Sharon it is noted for its fertility. Watered by the two permanent streams of the Kishon and the Belus, it possesses a rich soil, which is said to be at present "perhaps the best cultivated and producing the most luxuriant crops, both of corn and weeds, of any in Palestine."[10] The Kishon waters it on the south, where it approaches Carmel, and is a broad stream,[11] though easily fordable towards its mouth. The Belus (Namaan��) flows through it towards the north, washing Acre itself, and is a stream of even greater volume than the Kishon, though it has but a short course.
The third of the Ph?nician plains, as we proceed from south to north, is that of Tyre. This is a long but comparatively narrow strip, reaching from the Ras-el-Abiad towards the south to Sarepta on the north, a distance of about twenty miles, but in no part more than five miles across, and generally less than two miles. It is watered about midway by the copious stream of the Kasimiyeh or Litany, which, rising east of Lebanon in the Buka'a or C?lesyrian valley, forces its way through the mountain chain by a series of tremendous gorges, and debouches upon the Tyrian lowland about three miles to the south-east of the present city, near the modern Khan-el-Kasimiyeh, whence it flows peaceably to the sea with many windings through a broad low tract of meadow-land. Other rills and rivulets descending from the west flank of the great mountain increase the productiveness of the plain, while copious fountains of water gush forth with surprising force in places, more especially at Ras-el-Ain, three miles from Tyre, to the south.[12] The plain is, even at the present day, to a large extent covered with orchards, gardens, and cultivated fields, in which are grown rich crops of tobacco, cotton, and cereals.
The plain of Sidon, which follows that of Tyre, and is sometimes regarded as a part of it,[13] extends from a little north of Sarepta to the Ras-el-Jajunieh, a distance of about ten miles, and resembles that of Tyre in its principal features. It is long and narrow, never more than about two miles in width, but well-watered and very fertile. The principal streams are the Bostrenus (Nahr-el-Auly) in the north, just inside the promontory of Jajunieh, the Nahr-San?k, south of Sidon, a torrent dry in the summer-time,[14] and the Nahr-ez-Zaherany, two and a half miles north of Sarepta, a river of moderate capacity. Fine fountains also burst from the earth in the plain itself, as the Ain-el-Kanterah and the Ain-el-Burak,[15] between Sarepta and the Zaherany river. Irrigation is easy and is largely used, with the result that the fruits and vegetables of Sa?da and its environs have the name of being among the finest of the country.[16]
The plain of Berytus (Beyrout) is the most contracted of all the Ph?nician plains that are at all noticeable. It lies south, south- east, and east of the city, intervening between the high dunes or sand-hills which form the western portion of the Beyrout peninsula, and the skirts of Lebanon, which here approach very near to the sea. The plain begins at Wady Shuweifat on the south, about four miles from the town of Beyrout, and extends northwards to the sea on the western side of the Nahr Beyrout. The northern part of the plain is known as Ard-el-Burajineh. The plain is deficient in water,[17] yet is cultivated in olives and mulberries, and contains the largest olive grove in all Syria. A little beyond its western edge is the famous pine forest[18] from which (according to some) Berytus derived its name.[19]
The plain of Marathus is, next to Sharon, the most extensive in Ph?nicia. It stretches from Jebili (Gabala) on the north to Arka towards the south, a distance of about sixty miles, and has a width varying from two to ten miles. The rock crops out from it in places and it is broken between Tortosa and Hammam by a line of low hills running parallel with the shore.[20] The principal streams which water it are the Nahr-el-Melk, or Badas, six miles south of Jebili, the Nahr Amrith, a strong running brook which empties itself into the sea a few miles south of Tortosa (Antaradus), the Nahr Kubl��, which joins the Nahr Amrith near its mouth, and the Eleutherus or Nahr-el-Kabir, which reaches the sea a little north of Arka. Of these the Eleutherus is the most important. "It is