LAND RECLAMATION. 189 



land incapable of cultivation under any circumstances. 

 The Delta is also surrounded by desert and, even if cheap 

 fuel and greatly improved pumping appliances enable 

 irrigation water to be economically applied to land requiring 

 high lifts, still the possible expansion into a high desert 

 of unequal and varying level is very limited. 



Reclamation of land necessitates the following opera- 

 tion : first, irrigation; second, drainage ; third, levelling ; 

 fourth, cropping ; fifth, village building. The manner 

 and extent of these various operations depends on the 

 locality and nature of the land taken in hand. 



In the "Berea" district drainage is the first necessity. 

 Levelling is of minor importance us the beds of the lakes 

 show almost no inequality though there may be a very 

 gradual slope, so gradual that when the land is cut up 

 into small sections these are practically level. 



The small areas of waste land in villages have generally 

 irrigation and drainage close at hand and levelling is the 

 heavy item. They have been left uncultivated for this 

 reason. 



Border desert lands need little drainage, but irrigation 

 necessitates extensive water lifting, and levelling is in 

 many cases serious. 



Nearly all the reclaimable land in Egypt consists of the 

 great lakes and their margins, and the principles to be 

 followed in reclamation will be best illustrated by -a 

 consideration of what has been done at Aboukir. Lake 

 Aboukir, the smallest of all the lakes on the sea coast, 

 begins six miles east of Alexandria and occupied an area of 

 fifty square miles, or 29,621 feddans. It lay between the 

 Mahmoudieh canal and the Bay of Aboukir. The dimen- 

 sions were 12 J kilometres in length, east to west, and 



