H.—ANTHROPOLOGY. 179 
country, we have to go further south again for the earliest pre-dynastic 
fauna and flora of the Lower Nile Valley. This pre-dynastic fauna is 
particularly interesting, because, in addition to several of the animals 
already mentioned as occurring in dynastic times, we meet with others, 
such as the elephant,’* the kudu (Strepceros kudu),’* the gerenuk gazelle 
(Lithocranius walleri),"* a species of Sus'* (which is certainly not the 
wild boar, i.e. Sus scrofa), and the marabou stork (Leptoptilus 
erumenifer).’° From the nature and habits of these mammals and 
birds it is evident that there must have been a considerable rainfall in 
the Valley of the Nile north of Aswan when they frequented Egypt. 
Dr. Anderson has referred to this subject in his monograph on the 
Reptilia of Egypt. He notes that the physical features on both sides 
of the Nile * indicate the existence of a period long antecedent to the 
present, in which a considerable rainfall prevailed, as in the eroded 
valleys of the desert may be observed rocky ravines which have been 
carved out by the action of water, which has left behind it dry channels 
over which waterfalls had once precipitated themselves, and others 
down which cataracts once raced. The rainfall of the present is not 
sufficient to account for such a degree of erosion.’** ‘This evidence 
sanctions the conclusion that a material change in the character of the 
climate of North-Eastern Africa, so far as its rainfall is concerned, has 
taken place since pre-dynastic days. The flora of the valley of the 
Lower Nile also points to the same conclusion. Dr. Schweinfurth!’ has 
drawn. attention to the fact that many plants, now known in Egypt 
only under cultivation, are found in the primeval swamps and forests 
of the White Nile. He not unreasonably draws the inference that in 
ages long ago the entire Nile Valley exhibited a vegetation harmonising 
in its character throughout much more than at present. The papyrus 
swamps and reed marshes that lined the Lower Nile Valley in pre- 
agricultural days have been changed into peaceful fields, in which now 
_ grow the cereal grains, wheat and barley, and the other crops that have 
made Egypt famous as an agricultural country. It was the canalisa- 
tion of the Valley, carried out by man, and the consequent draining 
of the swamps and marshes that displaced the ancient flora from its 
northern seat, and made it, as at the present day, only to be found 
hundreds of miles higher up the river. The land of Egypt has, in 
fact, been drained by man; each foot of ground has been won by the 
sweat of his brow with difficulty from the swamp, until at last the 
wild plants and animals which once possessed it have been completely 
exterminated in it. The agricultural Egypt of modern times is as 
much a gift of man as it is of the Nile. 
I have dwelt at some length on the ancient fauna and flora because 
Tt want to bring out as clearly as I can two facts concerning the Egypt 
of pre-agricultural days—the Egypt of the time before man began to 
win the alluvial soil for the purposes of agriculture. ( 1) The aspect of 
the Lower Nile must have been very different from what it is now ; it 
was a continuous line of papyrus swamps and marshes inhabited by 
hippopotami, wild boars, crocodiles, and immense flocks of wild-fowl 
of all kinds; it was singularly destitute of trees or plants that could 
be put to any useful purpose, and timber-trees were non-existent; its 
