Notices of Egypt. 29 
ed abank, and from its top looked down, upon a broad mass of moving 
water. This was the Nile. In America, you meet with rivers eve- 
ry where, and they scarcely excite a sensation of any kind. Along 
the Mediterranean, however, they are so rare, that they become one 
of nature’s greatest wonders, and the sight of a large stream is really 
a gratification. 
The Nile is about as wide as the Connecticut at Middletown : the 
deepest boats I have seen on it, would require five feet water: the 
one in which we ascended drew about four, and yet we frequently 
grounded: in our descent, we gave ourselves up to the current, and 
thus, keeping more in the channel, we got along better. At this season, 
there is, regularly, a strong breeze up stream from morning till late 
in the evening: boats ascend by aid of sails, and unless they are in 
a hurry, descend simply by the force of the current. The water of 
the Nile, for drinking, deserves all the encomiums that have been 
passed-upon it. It is agreeable to the palate, and so light and inno- 
cent, that, although we have used prodigious quantities of it, no one 
has been injured: the wealthier natives, after letting it settle, keep it 
in thin bottles of porous unglazed earth; these are put in cool pla- 
ces, and all drink indiscriminately, from the bottles themselves. 
The river is now rising and is about half flood, the water of a deep 
yellow color; last year it did not reach the usual height, and it is 
feared this will be the case the present year also, although the rise 
began earlier than usual. 
I have amused myself, whenever we have stopped, at a perpendic- 
ular bank, with examiming the stratification of the earth, Whena , 
fresh vertical fracture or break is made, it is easy to trace the depos- 
its of each successive year, by means of a lighter earth on the top 
of each, and when a bit is taken into the hand it may be easily made 
to separate, at those lines, into cakes; but on close examination, the 
edge of each of these will be often found to be marked by very del- 
icate thin lines, parallel to those where the separation has taken place. 
I have, several times, been struck with the strong resemblance 
between these delicate lines and those which you and I saw in the 
coal at Maunch Chunk and Wilkesbarre. Judging from these strata, 
the yearly deposits appear to vary very much, but will average a 
httle more than a quarter of an inch. This corresponds also with 
what Mr. Trail, the superintendant of Ibrahim Pacha’s garden, on 
the Nile at Cairo, told me he considered the average deposit. 
I have put up specimens of the stratification, and hope to have the 
pleasure of presenting you with some of them. 
