172 



SUGAR. 



of the viceroy's family, or to companies. The forced labour system 

 being also to a certain extent abolished, the Fellaheen prefer making 

 as well as growing their own sugar, because, as they told me, the 

 central factory, under the new system of sale, frequently omitted 

 to pay them for their canes, but always exacted full price for the 

 sugar made from them. This short-sighted >nd thoroughly oriental 

 policy has generally reduced the factories to the manufacture of the 

 sugar grown on their own estates. 



" The nominal wages of a field labourer are three piastres, or six- 

 pence a day, or two piastres with liberty to grow corn between the 

 cane rows : except however on the prince's lands, where a quasi 

 slavery is winked at, there is great scarcity of labour, owing to the 

 large levies, and wasteful system of recruiting for the viceroy's army, 

 and public works. 



" The above causes have led to the abandonment of more than one 

 once flourishing manufactory, such as those at Farshiout Bajoura and 

 Gulf Sahau, though the actual breadth of cultivation is probably as 

 extensive as ever. 



" I visited several village factories ; this is the description of one 

 near the remarkable rock tombs of Tel Amarna. 



" The mill was under a rude shed partially screened by date palms, 

 and with a scanty palm thatch on the sunny side only, for there is 

 little fear of rain in Upper Egypt. It consisted of two vertical 

 wooden rollers about six inches in diameter turned by one ox. The 

 canes were passed and repassed three or four times between the 

 rollers, and very imperfectly ground after all. The small percentage 

 of juice flowed into a vat beneath ; when this was full the mill was 

 stopped, and the juice, mingled with all kinds of extraneous matter, 

 was carried in buckets to a deep iron pan under another shed, in 

 which it was evaporated over a charcoal fire and then cooled in 

 earthenware pots, like those under which seakale is grown in 

 England. The result, very coarse sugar and molasses, is doled out 

 to the Fellaheen in the proportions of their cultivation by the head 

 man of the village. 



" The factory which I inspected at Eanda was a much more imposing 

 affair, with its tall chimneys and spacious courtyard, its boiling 

 house, curing house, and distillery, and cloud of aromatic steam which 

 might be smelt a mile off on the other side of the river. It was on 

 the usual West Indian plan. The motive power was steam. The canes 

 were carried to the mill by camels instead of mules or oxen ; and there 

 was nothing very remarkable in the construction of tayches, or clari- 

 fiers. The yard and buildings were cleaner than they generally are in 

 the West Indies, but the still-house cisterns had the usual number of 

 dead rats floating in the fermenting liquid. The managers were 

 Egyptian Arabs and very intelligent people. Here, as in the villages, 

 the megass after passing the three rollers is carried back, and pressed 

 a second time ; it is then dry enough to be used almost immediately 

 under the coppers. The juice is clarified with lime, white of eggs, 

 and milk, and the greater part of the sugar is clayed in pots of the 

 usual form, with fine potters' clay brought from Keneh and Girgeh. 

 The loaves are not so white or fine as those imported from Europe, 



