"It is with youth as with plants, from the first fruits they bear we learn what may be expected in future."
The "Dead Sea" of America.
Flowing north from Utah Lake through part of the Great Basin, and emptying into the Great Salt Lake, the Dead Sea of America, is the river Jordan. Utah Lake is fresh water and abounds in fish; Salt Lake, as its name suggests, is so briny that no fish can live in its waters. To President Brigham Young and the worthy band of Pioneers, the Salt Lake Valley with the "Dead Sea" reflecting the glorious rays of a July sun, was indeed a "promised land."
The "Dead Sea" of the Holy Land.
Away across the Atlantic Ocean, stretching along the east shore of the Mediterranean Sea is another salt sea, another river Jordan, and another fresh water lake, and the river flows through the "Promised Land," or the Land of Canaan. However, if you will refer to a map of that country, you will see that the relative position of this lake, river and sea are just opposite in direction from these in Utah. In the Holy Land the fresh water lake is in the north, and the Jordan river flows south into the Dead Sea.
The land that contains these three important marks in history has several names. As given above, it is called The Holy Land; also The Land of Canaan; also the Land of the Hebrews, or the Land of Israel, because Jacob's children once settled there; also the Land of Judah, after one of Jacob's sons; also Palestine, probably after the Philistines, who lived, as you know, in the days of the shepherd boy David.
Size of Cannan.
Salt Lake is eighty miles long and about forty miles wide. The Land of Canaan is about twice as long and twice as wide; or in extreme length about one hundred seventy miles, and its width about eighty. The City of Dan was in the northern part, and Beersheba in the southern part; so when you hear the expression "from Dan to Beersheba," you will know that it once denoted the entire length of the land of Canaan.
Sea of Galilee.
The fresh water lake, of the Holy Land, also has several names. It is known generally as the "Sea of Galilee;" but it is also called "Sea of Tiberias," "Lake of Gennesareth," "Lake of Tiberias," and the "Sea of Cenneroth." It is about sixteen miles long and six miles wide. "The waters of this lake lie in a deep basin, surrounded on all sides with lofty hills, excepting only the narrow entrance and outlet of the Jordan at each extreme. * * * The appearance of this sea from the town of Capernaum, which is situated near the upper end of the bank on the western side, is extremely grand; its greatest length runs nearly north and south. The barren aspect of the mountains on each side, and the total absence of wood give, however, a cast of dullness to the picture, which is increased to melancholy by the dead calm of its waters."