282 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 
dicular, another extending towards Pelusium the hypotenuse, while 
the coast line from Alexandria to Port Said will represent the base. 
Softh of Heliopolis Egypt’s arable soil is confined to the Nile 
valley. Through this valley sluggishly flows the old Nile, of whose 
source and annual rise Herodotus tells so many marvellous stories. 
On each side of the river is a level strip of land, reaching back to 
the flanks of the mountain ranges. The part of this area contiguous 
to the river only is fertile, while over the remote parts the sands of 
the Desert maintain the mastery, and a perpetual struggle is carried 
on by the river on the one hand and the sand on the other. 
The valley gradually contracts southward, until the arable land 
becomes a mere strip which the Fellahin cultivate in the most Primi- 
tive method, and from which they derive the most scanty pittance. ° 
These green strips and the few palms, under whose shade the toiling 
Egyptians find shelter from the sun, are merely sufficient to relieve 
the monotony of barren sand and sun-bleached hills which meet the 
eye everywhere else. Only a little more than the tenth of the whole 
area of Egypt is capable of cultivation, so that only ten or eleven 
thousand square miles are the producing area. It is plain, therefore, 
the population must always be very limited. 
The most reliable statement gives Egypt now a population of about 
five million. In a country whose soil is so fertile, and which can 
produce two crops of wheat a year, a much denser population can be 
sustained. In ancient times the agricultural appliances seem to have 
been of the same kind as those now used, and as the Nile is Egypt’s 
perpetual fertilizer, the country was capable of supporting as dense a 
population then as now. Perhaps at no time has the population been 
so great as to test the producing power of the soil, for from the 12th 
Dynasty onwards, the period of Egypt’s greatest achievements in 
war, in architecture and literature, the foreign wars were a steady 
drain on the population. 
In that small country were laid the foundations of mathematics, 
astronomy and literature; and there, too, art achieved some of its 
mightiest and finest triumphs. On its soil the flag of almost every 
civilized nation has been unfurled, and tlfe annals of Egypt, on 
Papyrus Rolls, on the walls of ancient temples and tombs, record 
victories over now forgotten tribes and over powerful nations. Such 
a people is worthy of our study, who could erect massive pyramids 
and temples, that line the banks of the Nile for nearly 1,000 miles, 
