SOIL. 
il9 
fied the ravages of time, and the still more de- 
structive hand of man, we can only view the char- 
acters with regret, and lament that a wise and 
learned nation may perish before the monuments 
of their existence pass away. 
The external soil, or vegetable mould of Egypt, 
exhibits no similarity to the soil in any of the con- 
tiguous countries. Herodotus remarked, that 
the soil of Egypt was fat, black, and crumbling, 
though the earth of Libya was red and sandy, and 
the mould of Syria a strong clay intermixed with 
stones. Such is the physical structure of Egypt, 
where the Nile, as if fatigued with the boundless 
solitude of the Nubian deserts, seems to have se- 
lected a sequestered valley, more savage than the 
rest, to adorn it with the richest gifts of nature. 
The rich black clay of Abyssinia being transport- 
ed thither by the river, a fertile island arose in 
the midst of deserts, and the sediment accumulat- 
ing in a narrow gulf of the Mediterranean, at last 
created an impenetrable morass, covered with 
canes and reeds. This is the Egyptian Delta, 
concerning the origin of which so many disputes 
have been agitated, and which, as it involves a 
difficult geological problem, will probably con- 
tinue a subject of discussipn for many centuries. 
The names of the cities of Egypt, of its lakes, 
and of the branches of the Nile, have been so 
frequently altered and corrupted by the different 
