309 



flowed. Consequently the deeper the water, thus 

 charged with alluvion, and the longer it remains upon 

 lauds thus inundated, the greater must be the quan- 

 tity of deposites, and the increase of their elevation. 

 This fact is too palpable to need any comments. 



" Yet (says Dr. Shaw,) here we find it vary in. 

 proportion to the distance from the river ; being some- 

 times near the banks more than thirty feet high, whilst 

 at the utmost extremity of the inundation, it is not a 

 quarter part of so many inches." 



These facts alone, are amply sufficient to prove that 

 the delta of the Nile and the plains of Egypt were 

 never produced by the alluvion of that river. If any 

 other were necessary, the following is no less con- 

 clusive. 



"It may be presumed," says the Dr., " that all the 

 cities of Egypt icer* originally built upon artificial 

 eminences, raised for that purpose." Herodotus, from 

 whom Dr. Shaw probably derived his information, 

 says, "that during the reign of Sabacus, king of Ethi- 

 opia, the ground on which the cities of Egypt stood, 

 was more and more elevated by manual labour: and 

 that, although they were somewhat raised under the 

 reign of Sesostris, by the digging canals, they became 

 still more so, under the Ethiopian."* 



Now if those were artificial eminences, they could 

 not have been the results of annual deposites of alluvion. 

 Further, " When the circumjacent soil came to be so 



Euterpe, pages 137 and 138. 



40 



