412 Sir Colin Scott-Moncrieff [Jan. 25, 



name you will remember has come down in history as the destroyer 

 of the Alexandrian library). Omar approved of his conduct, but sent 

 him a paper to throw into the Nile. On the paper was written, 

 " From Abd Allah Omar, Prince of the Faithful, to the Nile of 

 Egypt. If thou flow of thine own accord, flow not ; but if it be 

 Allah, the one the mighty, who causeth thee to flow, then we implore 

 him to make thee flow." Amr threw the paper into the water, and 

 the Nile rose forthwith exactly as it was wanted. Since that day no 

 girl has been sacrificed ; but a pillar of earth is yearly left to be 

 washed away in the middle of the canal, called the bride or the girl. 



Such, as I have briefly described it, was the irrigation of Egypt 

 until this century, when it fell under the rule of Muhammed Ali, a 

 very sagacious and strong, if a very unscrupulous ruler. He saw that 

 the country could produce far more valuable crops than cereals. The 

 European market could be supplied with these from the fields of 

 Europe, but Europe could not produce cotton and sugar-cane. Egypt 

 had the climate, had the soil, had the teeming population ; but these 

 crops required water at all seasons ; nor would it do to flood the 

 fields to any depth, for just at the flood season the cotton crop is 

 ripening. There was plenty of water in the river ; but how was it to 

 be got on to the land ? Perennial irrigation was a fresh departure. 

 As I have said, the Nile rises about 25^ feet. A canal, then, running 

 12 feet deep in flood has its bed 13^ feet above the surface of the Low 

 Nile. Either the Nile water had to be raised, or the beds of the 

 canals had to be lowered, in order that one should flow into the other, 

 and after that the water had to be raised from the canal on to the 

 land. Muhammed Ali began by lowering the canal beds of Lower 

 Egypt, an enormous work considering the great number of the canals ; 

 and as they had been laid out on no scientific principles, but merely 

 to suit the fancies of Turkish pashas or village sheikhs, and as those 

 who had to excavate them to this great depth had only the slightest 

 knowledge of levelling, the inevitable result followed — the deep 

 channel became full of mud during the flood, and all the excavation 

 had to be done over again. Incredible as it may seem, this great 

 work was done year after year. It was a great serf population ; if 

 they were not fighting Muhammed Ali's battles in Arabia and Syria, 

 they might as well be digging out the canals. No one thought of 

 paying or feeding the workmen. The bastinado was freely applied 

 if they attempted to run away. If they died under the labour, there 

 were plenty more to come. But of course the work was badly done. 

 The water might enter the canal ; but, as the bed was not truly 

 levelled, it did not follow that it would flow far. Then, as the river 

 daily fell, the water in the canals fell too, and lessened in volume as 

 the heat increased, and more was required. At last — in June, 

 perhaps — the canal was dry, and the cotton crop that had been sown 

 and watered, weeded and nurtured, since March, was lost altogether. 



Then some one advised Muhammed Ali to throw a dam across the 

 river, and so raise the water, and the result was the great Barrage. 



