1904.] David George Hogarth on the Nile Delta. 449 



lost arms of the Nile. These are being reclaimed gradually from 

 the south by the Societe Anonyme du Behera, officered by Britons, 

 which offers a fine example of how western cajDital, judiciously 

 applied, may improve an eastern land and the society upon it, with- 

 out spoiling the native character and rendering it hybrid. The 

 process of reclamation and the inducements offered to new settlers 

 were described. Considering what the unreclaimed portion of these 

 flats is like now, it is amazing that signs of ancient inhabitation and 

 of the culture of cereals, olives and vines should be so abundant. So 

 difficult is the land to drain that one cannot but think it must 

 lie lower now than it did in antiquity. But to a certain extent it 

 was always a fen, as we know from many recorded facts and 

 especially a description by Heliodorus. 



The character of the ancient mounds was described, and their 

 disposition along the lines of two ancient Nile arms, the Thermuthiac 

 and the Athribitic ; and the lecturer then passed to. the northern or 

 littoral belt, which is mostly lagoon and sand, but somewhat thickly 

 inhabited by a fishing and gardening population. The surplus fish, 

 out of the enormous piscatorial wealth of Lake Burlos, is roughly 

 cured, or taken a short way up the canals inland and sold at auction. 

 The type of the fishermen, which shows traces of survival from a type 

 known on the ancient monuments, was commented upon, and the life 

 of the lake-shore settlements described. The most primaeval society 

 left in Egypt, it is, however, certain to suffer great modification in 

 the near future ; for the increase of births and social security, 

 resultant on the present state of things in the Nile valley, is causing 

 a steady flow of surplus population into the northern vacuum. 



[D. G. H.] 



