1874.] -^4 J [Delmar 



an endless rope chain, to which are attached earthen jars. Filling with 

 water at the bottom of the well or shaft, these jars empty themselves at 

 the top as they begin to descend. 



The shadouf is an upright foi'ked pole in which turns a beam with a 

 bucket or jar at one end and a lump of mud to balance it at the other. 



The tahout is a basket, to be handled by two men, and only used when 

 the water is to be raised but a few feet. The number of the vaiious im- 

 plements used for irrigating purposes in 1873 was as follows : 



Steam-pumps 476 



Sakyes {i) 30,084 



Shadoafs 70,508 



Tabouts 6,926 



107,994 

 Chief Articles of National Diet. 



Dates and dourra constitute the chief dietary of Egypt. It is a re- 

 markable fact that the number of date-trees under cultivation has gener- 

 ally coincided with the number of inhabitants and the number of acres of 

 cultivated lands. The causes of this correspondence with reference to the 

 number of date-trees are doubtless the coincidence of their pei'iod of bear- 

 ing with the ordinary duration of a man's life, and their yield of fruit 

 with the capacity of man to consume it, which for each tree and eacli 

 man is alike one pound a day. These circumstances combine to render 

 the tax, (now yielding about |700,000 per annum) which is placed apon 

 date-trees, really a tax on polls, of both sexes and all ages, amounting to 

 about 14 cents per capita. 



There are now about 5 million date-palm trees in Egypt. The trees 

 are raised by shoots, arrive at their vigor in about 30 years, and con- 

 tinue so for seventy years afterward, bearing yearly fifteen or twenty 

 clusters of dates, each of them weighing fifteen or twenty pounds. After 

 this period they begin to decline. Upwards of 200 trees ai"e sometimes 

 planted on a single acre (Buckle, 1, 61). Wilkinson, from whom Buckle 

 quoted, said 400 to a feddan. Accepting the lower nvimber as nearer the 

 truth, it would follow that 25,000 acres of land are devotetl to the growth 

 of date-palms in Egypt. The average annual yield in 1873 was four 

 cantars of dates to each tree (C. R,, 1873, p. 1086). This would make 

 the aggregate yield about 20 million cantars. All but 30 thousand cantars, 

 or one-sixth of one per cent., which is the amount annually exported, are 

 consumed in the country. Dates are not used for human food alone, but 



(i) The number of sakyes in use in 1838 -was estimated at 50,000, costing Z}4 million 

 dollars a year to work them, the power employed on each machine being that of two eattle 

 and one man ((J. R., 1833, p. 533). In 1837, for want of pi-uning-hooks or knives, the fellah- 

 deen engaged in cultivating cotton in Upper Egypt, broke off the branches instead of 

 cutting them ; while for want of a press, the bale of cotton was packed with the foot 

 ( MacGreggor). The absence of so common an instrument as a knife Is due to the fact 

 that the government prohibits the bearing of arms by the populace. The prudence of 

 this precaution is evidenced by the following extract from Stephens : "Speaking of the 

 general poverty of the Arabs, the Sheik said that if one-fourth of them owned a musket, 

 one charge of powder and one ball, before morning there would not be a Turk in Egypt." 



A. P. S. — VOL. XIV. 2f 



