DK. POKTEK ON EGYI'T. 23 



habitations destroyed by floods. Other villages are surrounded 

 by great dykes, as in Holland. When the Nile rises much 

 above its average height, the result is disastrous ; this, how- 

 cvei', is a rare occurrence. 



Some of the gigantic engineering works of the ancient 

 Egyptians are deserving of special notice. Among the earliest 

 was that huge embankment by which Menes, the first historic 

 Pharaoh, changed the course of the Nile, from its original 

 channel along the foot of the Libyan hills, to the centre of the 

 Valley eastward, thereby leaving a site in the old bed for the 

 great city of Memphis. Other engineering works of equal 

 magnitude were constructed in various parts of the country. 

 Probably the most ancient was the canal called Bahr Yusef, 

 "Joseph's River," taken from the Nile below Thebes, and 

 carried along the higher ground on the left bank, a distance of 

 some 200 miles. From it a branch was led off by Amenemha III. 

 {circa B.C. 2500), through a ravine and deep cutting in the 

 Libyan range, to the Fayoum, a low-lying, cup-shaped region, 

 with an area of 600 square miles. The canal is 30 feet deep, 

 160 feet wide, and about 10 miles long. At the place where 

 it entered the valley a reservoir, 14 miles long by 7 miles wide, 

 was constructed by drawing an embankment across the southern 

 end of the valley. Here the surplus water was stored, and by 

 an elaborate system of aqueducts and sluices the entire district 

 was irrigated and made one of the most fruitful provinces in 

 Egypt, still abounding in corn, vineyards, and, what is not 

 found elsewhere in the country, olive-groves. Fayoum was 

 the site of the famous Labyrinth erected by Amenemha, also 

 of several pyramids, and an obelisk, now fallen and broken, 

 apparently similar to that at Heliopolis. Some have supposed 

 that the canal and great reservoir of Fayoum were intended 

 to serve another purpose, — namely, to draw off a part of the 

 water of the Nile in seasons of abnormal rise, and thus to 

 save the lower country from dangerous flooding. Whatever 

 were the objects aimed at, the work was one of extraordinary 

 magnitude. 



Another great work was the canal from the Nile to the 

 Bitter Lake and Suez, now in part repaired and used for 

 supplying sweet water along the line of railway. Another 

 canal connected the Mediterranean and the Red Sea; and 

 another, made in the time of Rameses the Great, joined the 

 Nile to the Lake Mareotis, running past Alexandria. 



There is evidence that the course of the Nile itself, and the 

 channels of some of its branches in the Delta, have been 

 materially altered in past ages, partly by natural and partly 

 by artificial means. The Canopic branch ran in ancient times 



