HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part I. 



gress till it became a plough has been recognised in a cameo, published by Menestrier, on 

 which a pick-like plough is 

 drawn by two serpents {Jig^ 

 3. a): it may be also seen on 

 a medal from the village of 

 Enna, in Sicily, published by 

 Combe [b) ; in a figure given 

 by Spon, as found on an an- 

 tique tomb (c); in an Etrus- 

 can plough, copied from a 

 fragment in the Roman col- 

 lege at Rome, by Lasteyrie 

 (rf) ; and as we still see in 

 the instrument depicted by 

 Niebuhr, as used for plough- 

 ing i n Egypt and Arabia at the 

 present day. (e) Whatseems 

 to confirm these conjectures 

 is, that the image of Osiris 

 is sculptured with a similar 

 plough in each hand [Jig. 4. 

 abed), and with a harrow (e) 

 suspended by a cord (jT ) 

 over the left shoulder. This 

 plough there can be little 

 doubt was used in war as well 

 as in agriculture, and seems to have been of that kind with which the Israelites fought 

 against their enemies the Philistines (1 Sam xiii. 19- 23.) ; it is thought by some to be 

 the archetype of the letter alpha (the hieralpha of 

 Kircher) : and by others the sounds necessary to 

 conduct the processes of culture are thought to have 

 founded the origin of language. Thus it is that agri- 

 culture is considered by some antiquarians, as not only ^ 

 the parent of all other arts, but also of language and 

 literature. ^^1 



11. Whether the culture of corn was invented in 

 Egypt or not, all testimonies concur that cultivation 

 was carried to a higher degree of perfection there 

 than in any other country of antiquity. The canals 

 and banks which still remain in Lower Egypt, and 

 especially in the Delta, are evidences of the ex- 

 tent to which embanking, irrigation, and drainage 

 have been carried. These works are said to have been greatly increased by Sesostris^ 

 in the 17th or 18th century B.C. Many of the canals 'and drains have been 

 long obliterated ; but there are still reckoned eighty canals, like rivers, all excavated by 

 manual labor, several of which are twenty, thirty, and forty leagues in length. These 

 receive the inundations of the Nile, and circulate the waters through the country, which 

 before was wholly overflown by them. The large lakes of Moeris, Rehire, and Mareotis^ 

 formed vast reservoirs for containing the superfluous waters, from which they were con- 

 ducted by the canals over the adjacent plains. Upon the elevated ridges, and even on 

 the sides of the hills which form the boundary to the flat alluvial grounds, the water was 

 raised by wheels turned by oxen ; and by a succession of wheels, and gradations of 

 aqueducts, it is said some hills, and even moun- 

 tains, were watered to their summits. All the -r^t^^^ 5 

 towns at some distance from the Nile were sur- 

 rounded with reservoirs for the supply of the 

 inhabitants, and for watering the gardens. For 

 this last purpose the water was raised in a very 

 simple manner by a man walking on a plank with 

 raised edges, or on a bamboo or other tube.^iU 

 This is the machine alluded to by Moses, when 

 he speaks of sowing the seed and watering it 

 *' with the foot." {Deut. xi. 10.) They also 

 raised it by swinging it up in baskets [Jig. 5.) ; 



a mode which, like the others, remains in use at the present day. The water is lifted 

 in a basket lined with leather. " Two men, holding the basket between them, by a cord 

 in each end fastened to the edge of it, lower it into the Nile, and then swing it between 



