Delmar.] 



236 



Total Area of Egypt. 

 [Excluding the Soudan. (/) ] 



[Oct. 2, 



Egypt Proper. 



Egypt proper consists of Lower, Middle and Upper Egypt. It contains 

 160,866,560 acres of area, and a population (in 1871) of 5,203,405. It is 

 to this country only that the following statistics appertain, the outlying 

 provinces and protectorates being omitted, as desert or savage countries. 



Arable Area. 



The arable area of Egypt is confined substantially to the Inundable 

 portion of the valley of the Nile. As the river closely hugs the hills and 

 palisades on its right bank, this area is nearly altogether on its left. In 

 some places the arable lands are eleven miles wide ; in others they 

 dwindle to a mere strip of bank. For the most part, however, this area 

 extends westward from the river about five to ^ght miles, where it is 

 terminated by the Libyan hills and desert. Every year it is extended 

 by the rise of the river upon its own bed. This rise was found to be, at 

 the close of the last century, 4.960 inches per century. Some thirty years 

 a,go it was computed at 5.736 inches per century. From this source it is 

 said that about 65,000 to 70,000 feddans of area are annually reclaimed 

 from the desert (C. R. 1873, p. 1070) ; but, as will presently be shown, 

 there may be as much or more lost from other causes ; the area of culti- 

 vable land depending more upon social and industrial, than natural events. 



(/). The Soudan Provinces include the Valley of the White Nile to the great N'Yanza 

 Lakes and extend across the Continent of Africa westward from Nubia and south of 

 Sahara. Their entire area is estimated at 1,600,000 square miles (about one-half the 

 area of the United States), and it is said to contain 14 million feddans of land sus- 

 ceptible of cultivation (C. R. 1873, p. 1081), and a population of 60 millions, negroes. The 

 south-eastern extremity of the Soudan was recently taken possession of by Sir Samuel 

 Baker in the name of the Egyptian Government. It is accessible by small steamers 

 from the lower Nile, and a railway is projected via Khartoum and Gondokoro. 



