268 TlMEHRI. 



of revenue. In 1891 it yielded ;^38,ooo profit, after paying 4 per 

 cent, interest on the Daira debt of seven and one quarter millions 

 sterling. 



The three controllers, a native, an Englishman and a Frenchman, 

 have the management of 475,000 acres of land, of which 150,000 are 

 waste. Sugar cane alternated with cereals, is grown over about 180,000 

 acres, situated in Upper Egypt, of which over 30,000 acres are always 

 under sugar, which is crushed in the mills of the Daira and constitutes 

 the chief source of revenue. Another traft of 140,000 acres situated 

 north of the sugar distri6l and in Lower Egypt, produces the usual 

 cereal crops and yielded a net profit varying from 3s. 6d. to lis., and 

 averaging 5s. 8d. per acre. The system adopted by the controllers, 

 which is the only right one for properties of such magnitude, is to lease 

 the lands to cultivators rather than cultivate them direftly, and last 

 year they leased 309,000 acres and cultivated direft or on joint account 

 with tenants, only 14,000 acres. 



The controllers fix a uniform price at which their tenants are bound 

 to deliver to the faflories all the canes grown on the sugar estates, and 

 this price enables the tenants to support their families and to pay a 

 rent to the Daira, which then makes a profit on the manufacture of the 

 sugar. The Daita gives all necessary assistance to its tenants by 

 supplying ploughing, seed, irrigation, etc , and, though its leases con- 

 tain all the usual stringent clauses, it invariably exercises great for- 

 bearance toward all deserving tenants — a principle found to be 

 advantageous to both. Improvements to the machinery and in the 

 processes of the manufacture and also close supervision over the culti- 

 vation and all details are among the methods by which the adminis- 

 tration has attained an unanticipated success. 



Their total production of sugar in 1891 was 58,728 tons. Very 

 much more could be grown, but the existing machinery could not work 

 more during the twenty-four to forty-eight hours between the cutting 

 of the cane and its crushing, a period, which cannot be exceeded with- 

 out causing deterioration. Mr. Lang forecasts an increase of surplus 

 to ^66,000 for 1892. The example of the Daira Sanieh has induced a 

 private company, with a capital of ;^i20,ooo, to start sugar growing 

 and manufacture upon 7,000 acres, and they expeCt to put their crop on 

 the market next January. Upper Egypt is very well adapted for sugar 

 cultivation on a large scale, it is a more remunerative crop than cereals, 

 but the large outlay necessary for the machinery puts it out of the 



