CHAPTER XXXII 



Flies and Lice in Egypt ^ 

 H. A. Ballou 



Egypt, among its other characteristics, is a land of flies. Whether 

 they have been abundant there eyer since the days of the plague of flies 

 of Moses and Rameses may be open to argument, but there can be no 

 doubt that in these times the abundance of flies is one of the things that 

 strikes the visitor to the land of the Pharaohs. 



I had the good fortune to live in a small village where flies were not 

 very troublesome, and that, in spite of tlie fact that a fairly large veter- 

 inary camp was situated in the village. This camp was in charge of 

 British Army officials and the village itself had been planned and built 

 by a company, most of the stockholders and officials of which were 

 British subjects, if not indeed actually natives of Great Britain. 



The native villages in the agricultural districts and the native sections 

 of all the large cities and towns arc, and I suppose always have been, 

 infested with swarms of flies. This state of aff'airs results from the 

 manner of living of the people, the nature of their religion and their 

 superstitions. As to the first of these points, the Egyptians have alwa^^s 

 been an agricultural people, that is to say, they live on the land and by 

 the land. Most of them are peasants or small proprietors, a compara- 

 tively few are wealthy. In the past few years a fairly large number of 

 them has become well-to-do. 



Egypt is a country practically without a rainfall. Within present 

 geological time it has never been forested. The people throughout the 

 whole of their history have been accustomed to live in dirt and dust, and 

 they have not had wood for building houses or for fuel. They live in 

 houses of sun-dried mud and they burn for fuel the manures of their 

 domestic animals. 



The space available for village sites is limited to slightly elevated 

 spots, which are generally too high to be irrigated and are thus useless 

 for planting, and they are to some extent above tlie reach of flood and 

 infiltration of water. Very often these mounds are tlie covered-down ruins 

 of forgotten cities or towns. The houses arc close together, often 



^This lecture was presented to the class Oct. 7, 1918. Tt was written immediately 

 after Dr. Ballou's return from Egypt and gives a good idea of an unsanitary nation. 



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