38 



COTTON IN EGYPT AND THE SUDAN. 



the land could be sold or rented, and even given in mortgage. Thus 

 private ownership of land was in a sense proclaimed, although not 

 literally. From 1861 Europeans were allowed to acquire 

 " Karadshi" land in Egypt and the law concerning the "Mokabala," 

 which was due to Ismail Pasha's lack of money, brought, in 1871, 

 full freedom of land : now every one could acquire free possession of 

 his land if he paid his tax for six years in advance. Of this permis- 

 sion, and of the later facilities in the acquisition of land, full use 

 has been made. 



The important law of March 14th, 1899, abolished the difference 

 between the two kinds of Ushuri and the Karadshi lands, and fixed 

 for the future the land tax for each feddan of agricultural land 

 at 28*64 per cent, of the rental, or, if one considers this to be 5 per 

 cent, of the value of the land, as a yearly tax of 1'43 per cent, on the 

 land value. Up to 1907 the survey of 'the entire cultivable land of 

 7,000,000 feddans was completed, just as well as it is carried out 

 in Europe, and transfers of property are registered in the Doomsday 

 Book exactly as in Europe. The right of ownership is therefore 

 quite settled, and jurisdiction and other securities are entirely satis- 

 factory in Egypt. 



Distribution of the Land. In the census of 1907 of 11^ million in- 

 habitants 2,440,000 persons, or 41 per cent, of the entire male popu- 

 lation, were stated to be engaged in farming, and 1,441,000 were, in 

 1911, owners of land. 



At the present day the land belongs partly to the State Domains 

 and partly to special land companies and mortgage banks; the 

 Khedive, his relations, and a few rich pashas own large tracts of 

 land ; then there are Turks, Arabs, Greeks, and also a small num- 

 ber of other Europeans who own land on a large scale, but as the 

 former two are Oriental, and consequently bad organisers, they do 

 not manage their own estates, but leave that work to some native 

 bailiffs. The Wakf, the board of religious institutes for Moham- 

 medan and Coptic churches and schools, has a certain ownership 

 of land, but the major portion of the cultivated land belongs to the 

 peasants, as is seen from the following table. 



In 1906 the land ownership, with exception to the Government 

 lands, was divided into lots : 



In comparison with 1896, in which year the foreign 

 owners were for the first time registered, .the remarkable 

 result is shown that the lowest classes of natives had a large increase 



