1895.] on Tie Nile. 413 



About twelve miles north of Cairo the Nile bifurcates, and finds 

 its way to the sea, by the Bosetta and Damietta branches. Across 

 the heads of these two branches were built two stone bridges, one of 

 71, the other of 61 arches, each 5 metres or 16 '4 feet span. These 

 arches were intended to be fitted with gates ; by lowering which, all 

 the water would be dammed up, and diverted into three great trunk 

 canals, taken out of the river just above these bridges. One to the 

 right or east of the Damietta branch was to supply water to all the 

 provinces of the eastern delta ; one between the two bridges was to 

 supply the splendidly fertile central delta ; the third, to the left or 

 west of the Eosetta branch, was to water all the western delta down 

 to Alexandria. 



There was no intention of water storage at the Barrage, but it was 

 merely with the object of controlling the supply. While there was 

 water enough in the river, by closing the gates it could be kept to a 

 uniform level, and sent down the three trunk canals, from which it 

 was to branch, into many minor ones. As the river went down, gate 

 after gate would be closed, and so a constant supply could be kept in 

 the canals. The idea was thoroughly sound. The execution was feeble. 



Mougel Bey, the French engineer in charge of the work, had no 

 doubt many difficulties to contend with. The work went fitfully on 

 for many years, thousands of men being forced to it one year, and 

 carried off to a campaign the next. But at last it was sufficiently 

 finished to allow of an opening ceremonial in 1861. Gates had been 

 fitted into the Eosetta branch arches, never into the Damietta. 



The central canal had been dug in tolerably satisfactory style. 

 The western canal, too, had been dug, but passing through a strip of 

 desert it had become very much filled up with sand. The eastern 

 canal was dug some five miles, and then stopped. Of course the 

 Barrage without these canals was useless. However, they began to 

 experiment with it, closing the gates on the Eosetta side. It was 

 intended to hold up 4J metres, or 14 feet 9 inches of water. It never 

 held up 5 feet, till in 1867, it cracked across from top to bottom, on 

 the Western side. An immense coffer dam was built round the 

 cracked portion, and the w-ater was never held up again more than 

 about 31 feet, while the work was looked on as a deplorable failure. 

 In 1883, all hope of making anything out of the Barrage was 

 abandoned, and the Government were on the point of concluding a 

 contract with a company to supply Lower Egypt with irrigation by 

 means of an immense system of steam pumps, to cost 700,000Z. to 

 begin with, and 250,000Z. a year afterwards. 



That year there was a wretched serf army of 85,000 men working 

 at canal clearances for 160 days, unfed, unpaid. The burden was 

 nearly intolerable, The irrigation was all by fits and starts. There 

 was no drainage ; every hollow became sour and water-logged. With 

 waterways everywhere, there was no navigation. In Upper Egypt 

 things were better, as the system was a simpler one. But when we 

 came to look into them, too, we found great abuse, and on an average 



