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Show EUPHRATES A MIGHTY RIVER Flows Through the Cradle of Civilization Civiliza-tion Where Empires Have Risen and Fallen. The Euphrates is the largest river in western Asia and civilization is reputed re-puted to have come into being upon Its banks. For six thousand years at least empires have risen and fallen on its pTain, conquering armies have marched to battle and a hundred cities have come up out of the earth and fallen into obliterate ruin again. Describing this great river as it runs Its seaward course today, the National Geographic society, whose headquarters headquar-ters are in Washington, says in a statement given to the press: "The Euphrates lays a strong claim to the honor of being the most historic his-toric river on earth and certain it Is that in the region it drains, along with its twin sister, the Tigris, man first emerged from behind that Impenetrable Impene-trable curtain which divides the known from the unknown past. "From then henceforth civilizations have raised their proud heads above come and gone, cities of rare beauty have risen their proud heads above the plain only to pass on into obliterate obliter-ate ruin. "The Euphrates rises in two arms, flowing parallel to one another on the north side of Taurus mountain, through narrow valleys Into which pour innumerable small streams from he high Armenian plateau. The j northernmost of the two branches is the shortest, but it is generally regarded re-garded as the real source of the river. It lies to the north of Erzerum, while the longer branch passes it to the south. The two branches are divided by the wild mountain district of Der-siHa. Der-siHa. After . uniting they form the Euphrates proper, which boldly breaks its way through the mountains by a zigzag course that carries it now to the right and now to the left. Now it flows for 30 miles at right angles to its general course, then 60 miles parallel to it and then 180 miles at right angles again, as though It were headed for the Mediterranean Bea. Then it winds to the south for 80 miles. "Here it takes up its general rend to the southeast and with innumerable innumer-able sharp windings and bends, but with only a few broad curves It heads its way to the sea. The air line distance dis-tance of the remotest spring of the Euphrates from the sea is only 800 miles and yet Its waters must travel 1,800 miles before they reach the sea. In the last 1,200 miles of its course the Euphrates is slow and sluggish, wandering wan-dering all over the land when It has opportunity, making that which It touches a marsh and that which it cannot reach a desert. "Its fall during the last 1,200 miles is only ten Inches to the mile and it broadens out so much that while it contains enough water to float the greatest battleship, It Is so shallow that at places a swimmer cannot float la It." |