• 





, v 



; 









i 



•a 



nay W6 



lela 



- aearh 





ipp 



illriii 



ohl i 



> s! 'I 

 nan' 



sary 



?neral!. r 

 f act 





ted of 

 time 



r 



i 



Ch. XVIIL] 



DELTA OF THE NILE. 



431 



in extent. Strabo himself, on comparing the outline of the 

 coast in his time with its ancient state, was convinced, like 



our cou: 

 the sea. 



man 



formed strata of Asia Minor 



>/ 



stone, not of loose incoherent materials. Almost all the 

 streamlets and rivers, like many of those in Tuscany and the 

 south of Italy, hold abundance of carbonate of lime in solu- 

 tion, and precipitate travertin, or sometimes bind together 

 the sand and gravel into solid sandstones and conglomerates ; 

 every delta and sand-bar thus acquires solidity, which often 



if n n • i "■ • . - _ 



from forcing- their way through them 



r mouths i 



if the Nile 



was 



—That Egypt was ' the gift of the Mle,' 

 f her priests before the time of Hero- 

 dotus ; and there can be no doubt that the fertility of the 

 alluvial plain above Cairo, and the very existence of the 

 delta below that city, are due to the action of the great river, 

 or to its power of transporting mud from the interior of 

 Africa, and depositing it on its inundated plains, as well as 

 on that space which has been redeemed from the Medi- 

 terranean, and converted into land. 



The depth of the Mediterranean is about twelve fathoms 

 at a small distance from the shore of the delta ; it after- 

 wards increases gradually to 50, and then suddenly descends 

 to 380 fathoms, which is, perhaps, the original depth of the 

 sea where it has not been rendered shallower by fluviatile 



matter. "We 



JSTewbold 



where he has observed the 

 distance of 40 miles from t 



Medite 



them 



t The small progress 



of the delta in the last 2,000 years affords, perhaps, no 

 measure for estimating its rate of growth before it had en- 

 croached so much upon the coast-line of the Mediterranean. 

 A powerful current now sweeps along the shores of Africa, 

 from the Straits of Gibraltar to the prominent convexity 

 of Egypt, the western side of which is continually the prey 



t Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. 1848, vol. 



* Karamania, or a brief description of 

 the Coast of Asia Minor, &c. London, 

 1817. 



iv. p. 342. 



