320 



no path remains to guide the traveller's course ; the 

 impressions of his footsteps are effaced almost as soon 

 as made, and billows of sand, raised by the impetuous 

 winds, sometimes swallow him up."* 



Another canal, called Trajan's, was cut, leading 

 from the Nile, near Cairo, to the gulf of Suez ; and 

 also another, said to have been dug by Omar, still fur- 

 ther down the river. These are all filled up, and 

 have disappeared ; and that too, so far in the time of 

 Cleopatra, that her ships were dragged across the isth- 

 mus by land.f 



The ancient Pelusiac branch of the Nile, on which 

 stood the city of Bubastis, has long since been de- 

 serted by its stream, except during the height of the 

 inundation of the Nile, some water flows in the slight 

 depression which marks its former course. Several 

 others, of smaller magnitude, have also disappeared, 

 and no traces of them left. Mr. Volney says, " the 

 canals which conveyed these (waters) were destroyed ; 

 for in this shifting soil, they are rapidly choaked up, 

 both by the action of the winds, and by the cavalry of 

 the Bedouin Arabs. ?? J But the most important instance 

 in this view, is that of the ancient bed, in which the 

 Nile flowed at the foot of the Lybian range, before the 

 time of Menes. 



This channel, in which the whole body of the Nile 

 once flowed, is nearly filled up to a level with its 



* Sonini's Travels, vol. 2. p. 128. 

 t See Life of Anthony. 

 | Volney's Travels, p. 135. 



