32 On the Arabian Frontier of Egypt. 



as the diflFerence caused by the downward slope of the lands 

 through which the water had to run. 



But the commercial importance of this great undertaking 

 lost nothing material by stopping short of actually piercing 

 through the central natural dyke of the isthmus to which 

 the Delta owes its existence ; since that spot is only a low 

 plateau between the hills, five miles or thereabouts in length, 

 and eight feet above the sea in its highest part. A short and 

 easy overland transit like this, over a narrow plain only five 

 miles long from the end of the canal to the sea, could be no 

 serious obstacle to commerce and traffic, when the line of 

 navigation by the river on one side, and by the sea on the 

 other, was wholly uninterrupted. 



Nor does etymology require that the canal should run 

 into the sea, to identify this site with the Pl-HA-HIROTH of 

 Scripture, near which the Hebrew army encamped " by the 

 sea." For that compound expression would quite as correct- 

 ly designate any kind of opening or outlet, as that of a 

 stream, natural or artificial. And when we consider the 

 position and configuration of this spot, — that this overland 

 passage is flanked to the right and left by a steep ascent, 

 which forms the table-land, capped with sand-hills, of the ori- 

 ginally divided continents of Asia and Africa, we can under- 

 stand why it was called ~^^':;!'? the " moutlC or " opening 

 of Hiroth ;" — the pass or gorge in the hills, forming the only 

 oiDcning that leads from the sea to that celebrated ancient 

 city, via the canal of the same name. It is the very expres- 

 sion employed by Herodotus, when he speaks of the canal 

 being completed by Darius, who cut it across this spot ; 

 " and where a mountain opens towards the south, it is dis- 

 charged into the Arabian Gulf." The formidable obstacle 

 presented by the great height of the Red Sea rendered its 

 completion too difticult to be worth running the superfluous 

 risk of the undertaking, while there was such an easy natural 

 road as the " opening of Hero ;'''' until another obstruction 

 to commercial traffic was presented, by the gradually in- 

 creasing height of the great shoal between the upper gulf 

 and the open sea. This necessitated a second overland 

 joui-ney across an inhospitable and much longer tract, — for 



