20 COTTON IN EGYPT AND THE SUDAN. 



irrigation in Egypt means desert, flood-irrigation gives one crop in the 

 year, but canal irrigation gives two or three crops on the same soil. 



Egypt is now divided into five irrigation districts, with an English 

 engineer at the head of each ; the irrigation service is capitally 

 organised, and renders to agriculture invaluable benefits, for the 

 prosperity of the land depends upon the proper distribution of the 

 waters of the Nile. In every province there is an agricultural 

 " council," which does not really see to the cultivation, but to the 

 judicious distribution of the water, to the opening and shutting of 

 the collecting basins, and keeps in touch with and advises the 

 irrigation engineers. 



In the months from September to April the water in the Nile is 

 plentiful; towards the beginning of May the water level becomes 

 too low in the Nile to feed the enormous network of canals, and from 

 then, i.e., from May to August, the water stored up in the reservoirs 

 is used; it is given out in so-called ''rotations," the duration of 

 which changes according to circumstances ; in unfavourable cases 

 the fields receive 6 days water and none during 18 days. 



During flood-time in Upper Egypt the Nile seems like a long 

 lake, out of which the villages rise like islands, but on account of the 

 regular canalisation existing in the Delta, the landscape there hardly 

 changes through the flood. As in Upper Egypt, too, the flood-water 

 is being taken more and more into canals, the well-known picture 

 of the " flooded Nileland " will gradually disappear. 



The whole of the arable land of Egypt, the extension of which is 

 limited by the possibility of irrigation by the water of the Nile, and 

 must therefore always remain relatively a narrow strip of land, is 

 divided into two large classes as regards the level of the water from 

 the earth's surface, viz., the land flooded by the Nile, called " Raye," 

 and the higher lying " Sharaki " land, which can only be watered 

 by artificial irrigation. 



In order to bring the water to these high lands, which are at 

 times in three, four, or more terraces, and where the flood cannot 

 get, the people have to use several artificial means for raising 

 the water, by human power, or animals, driving winches, and, 

 latterly, by power machines. 



The most primitive appliance is the "Nataleh," it is a swinging 

 basket, made out of date palm leaves ; it is fastened to four sticks, 

 and whilst the basket is swung it lifts the water to 1 metre high. 

 This contrivance is little used. Another simple device for raising 

 water is the " Warbur," an open wooden trough, 2^ by 3 metres 

 long ; it is fastened to the bank by a rope and is dropped into the 

 canal and raised up by one man ; it lifts from ^ metre level. More 

 elaborate, but easily worked, is the "Tambur," the Archimedian 

 water-screw, which is made of wood or iron, and is used very 

 frequently in the Delta by small peasants ; it has the advantage of 

 being easily carried about from place to place. Very ancient is the 

 ** Shaduf, " which is worked by one person ; it is a scaffold structure, 

 similar to a toll-bar, with a leather bucket, in which the water is 

 raised to a height of 3 metres. Still more easily worked is the 

 " Sakije," or the " Noria," an appliance like a winch, lately much 

 improved, driven by oxen or camels ; on its scoop wheel are fixed 

 earthenware pots ; it raises the water from 3 to 8 metres. Still more 



