50 



which contains live oa.scs and a large part of the Sinai Peninsula, is 

 about 890,000 square miles. Of this less than 3 per cent, or about 

 6,000,000 acres, can ever be cultivated. The accompanj^ing map (PL 

 XVIII) enables a comparison to be made of the Nile Valley with that 

 of the Platte Eiver. It will be noticed that the mouths of the Platte 

 and the Damietta branch of the Nile are coincident. The two rivers 

 cross the north boundary of Colorado near the same point, and Denver 

 and Assnan lie only a few miles apart. Egypt proper, therefore, has 

 about the same length as the Platte Valle}^ from Denver to the Mis- 

 souri River. The width of the Platte Valley in Ne))raska is about the 

 same as that of the Nile from Assuan to Cairo. Only 5,1-15,000 acres 

 are now cultivated in the valley of the Nile. A similar area of agri- 

 cultural land in Nebraska would have produced in 1900 crops having 

 a total value of about $26,000,000. The farming lands of Egypt pay 

 more than this in taxes each year. Nebraska received in 1900 a little 

 over f (>,000,000 from all its sources of revenue. Egypt received about 

 $60,000,000. Nebraska has no bonded indebtedness and but a small 

 floating debt. Egypt has a complication of tinancial troubles, owing 

 in the aggregate $516,000,000, or $100 for each acre of agricultural 

 land. 



But little arable land in Upper Egypt remains unreclaimed, and the 

 area enjoying perennial irrigation can not be extended until reservoirs 

 are provided to store the water which is needed in May and June. 

 With the growth of the reservoir system basin irrigation will disap- 

 pear. There are now 120 of these basins in Upper Egypt, varying in 

 size from 500 to 35,000 acres. Each year many of these basins fail to 

 receive the volume of water needed and the yield of the crops is cor- 

 respondingly reduced. Taxes on such land have to be remitted, entail- 

 ing a loss to the treasury of $220,000 annually. Although the basin 

 system has been greatly improved during the past twenty years, yet 

 so evident are the advantages of perennial irrigation that the demand 

 for reservoirs has been growing. In Lower Egypt 1,300,000 acres can 

 be reclaimed when water for irrigation is made available. According 

 to a rough determination of the duty of water, made ])y engineers, it 

 will require 33,00o cubic feet per second, or T5,1:(J0 acre-feet per da}^, 

 to irrigate this land. 



The mean discharge of the Nile for January is about 140,000 acre- 

 feet per day. For February it is about 104,000, and for March it is 

 73,000 acre-feet per day, in this month falling below the volume which 

 will be needed when all the irrigable land in Egypt is brought under 

 cultivation. In April and June the mean discharge per day is about 

 61,000 acre-feet. In May it falls as low as ■14,500 acre-feet per day. 

 The mean discharge in acre-feet per day for July is 182,000. While 

 some shortage may occur very early in this month, yet it is not one of 



