6 THE LAW OF MASSACRE. 



Not only did the land produce enormous crops of 

 corn ; the ditches and hollows which were filled by 

 the overflowing Nile supplied a harvest of wholesome 

 and nourishing aquatic plants ; and on the borders of 

 the desert, thick groves of date palms which love a 

 neutral soil, embowered the villages, and formed live 

 granaries of fruit. 



But however plentiful food may be in any country, 

 the population of that country, as Mai thus discovered, 

 will outstrip it in the long run. If food is unusually 

 cheap, population will increase at an unusually rapid 

 rate, and there is no limit to its ratio of increase ; no 

 limit, that is to say, except disease and death. On 

 the other hand, there is a limit to the amount of food 

 that can be raised, for the basis of food is land, and 

 land is a fixed quantity. Unless some discovery is 

 made, by means of which provisions may be manu- 

 factured with as much facility as children, the whole 

 earth will some day be placed in the same predica- 

 ment as the island in which we live, which has out- 

 grown its food-producing power, and is preserved from 

 starvation only by means of foreign corn. 



At the time we speak of Egypt was irrigated by 

 the Nile in a natural, and therefore imperfect manner. 

 Certain tracts were overflooded, others were left com- 

 pletely dry. The valley was filled with people to the 

 brim. When it was a good Nile, every ear of corn, 

 every bunch of dates, every papyrus stalk and lotus 

 root, was pre-engaged. There was no waste and no 

 surplus store. But sometimes a bad Nile came. 



The bread of the people depended on the amount 

 of inundation, and that on the tropical rains, which 

 vary more than is usually supposed. If the rainy 

 season in the Abyssinian highlands happened to be 



