xlii 



INTRODUCTION, 



where a boat laden with the catch was waiting to take me back to Assiut, which was 

 reached close on midnight. 



After leaving Assiut I stopped at Sohag, Akhmim, Girgeh, Nag Hamadeh, and 

 Ma'abdeh, at each of which I visited the halagers. Three weeks were spent at Assuan, 

 which I reached on December 25th, and at Shellal, which is situated at the head of 

 the First Cataract, 



Pig. 24. 





In the cataract a method of catching fish known to the Arabs as " cower " is used, 

 and is said to be a very ancient one ; it consists of a series of low stone enclosures 

 with narrow entrances facing clown-stream (diagram, fig. 24), and usually divided into 

 two or three compartments, each with a narrow entrance set in line erected in the bed 

 of the river. The various chambers are V-shaped, and so arranged that the water 

 passes through them and even in places over their walls, so that it is very difficult, if 

 not impossible, for fish to force their way up-stream except at the entrances to the 

 enclosures, which seem to promise every facility for this feat. Once inside the first 



