which it loses itself after a source of about 80 miles.

The Orontes, the great river of Assyria, rises in the Buka'a--the deep
valley known to the ancients as Coele-Syria Proper--springing from
a number of small brooks, which flow down from the Antilibanus range
between lat. 34° 5' and lat. 34° 12'. Its most remote source is near
Yunin, about seven mites N.N.E. of Baalbek. The stream flows at first
N.W. by W. into the plain, on reaching which it turns at a right-angle
to the northeast, and skirts the foot of the Antilibanus range as far as
Lebweh, where, being joined by a larger stream from the southeast,130 it
takes its direction and flows N.W. and then N. across the plain to the
foot of Lebanon. Here it receives the waters of a much more abundant
fountain, which wells out from the roots of that range, and is regarded
by the Orientals as the true "head of the stream." Thus increased the
river flows northwards for a short space, after which it turns to the
northeast, and runs in a deep cleft along the base of Lebanon, pursuing
this direction for 15 or 16 miles to a point beyond Ribleh, nearly
in lat. 34° 30'. Here the course of the river again changes, becoming
slightly west of north to the Lake of Hems (Buheiret-Hems), which is
nine or ten miles below Ribleh. Issuing from the Lake of Hems about lat.
34° 43', the Orontes once more flows to the north east, and in five or
six miles reaches Hems itself, which it leaves on its right bank.
It then flows for twenty miles nearly due north, after which, on
approaching Hama (Hamath), it makes a slight bend to the east round
the foot of Jebel Erbayn, and then entering the rich pasture country of
El-Ghab' runs north-west and north to the "Iron Bridge" (Jisr Hadid),
in lat. 36° 11'. Its course thus far has been nearly parallel with
the coast of the Mediterranean, and has lain between two ranges of
mountains, the more western of which has shut it out from the sea.
At Jisr Hadid the western mountains come to an end, and the Orontes,