EGYPT. 
m 
ral Egyptian temple. Each is of one entire piece of red 
granite, fixty-five feet high. 1 he French having erected 
trophies and infcriptions of their conqueft, in moft of 
the principal towns in Egypt; major-general the earl of 
Cavan, for the more impartial information of pofterity, 
erected the following infcription on the pedettal of Cleo¬ 
patra’s Needle : 
In the Year of the Chrifti’an -Era, 1798 , 
The Republic of France 
Landed on the Shores of Egypt an Army of 40,000 Men, 
Commanded by their moil able aud.fuccefsful General 
Bonaparte. 
The Conduct of the General, and the Valour of the Troops, 
Effected tire entire Subjection of that Country ; 
But under Divine Providence it was referred for the 
Biitilh Nation 
To annihilate their ambitious Defitrns : 
Their Fleet was attacked, defeated, and deftroyed. 
In Aboukir Bay, 
By a Britiih Fleet of equal Force, 
Commanded by Admiral Lord Nelfon. 
Their intended Conqueft of Syria 
Was counteracted at Acre 
By a molt gallant Refiftance 
Under Commodore Sir Sidney Smith ; 
And Egypt was refeued from their. Dominion 
By a Britiih Army, inferior in Numbers, but 
Commanded by General Sir Ralph Abercrombie, 
Who landed at Aboukir on the 8th of March 1801 , 
Defeated the French o.i feveral Occafions, 
Particularly in a mod decifive Action near Alexandria, 
On the 21ft of that Month, 
When they were driven .from the Field, 
And forced to thelter thcmfelves 
In their Garrifons of Cairo and Alexandria, 
Which Places l'ubfequently furrendered 
By Capitulation. 
To record to future Ages thel'e Events ; 
And to commemorate the Lofs fuftained 
By the Death of 
Sir Ralph Abercrombie, 
Who was mortally wounded 
On that memorable Day, 
Is the defign of this Infcription, 
Which was depofiled here in the Year of Clirift 1802 , 
By the Britiih Army on their evacuating this Country, 
And reftoring it to the Turkifh Empire. 
The formation of the Delta, or iHand inclofed by the 
eaftern and weftern branches of the Nile, is the mo ft cu¬ 
rious phenomenon in the hiftory of Lower Egypt. The 
Nile is faid originally to have conlilted but of one ftream 
at its mouth, and to have emptied itfelf into the fea as 
high up as the ancient Heliopolis. That the repuilion 
of the waters of the ocean, aimott conftantly, but parti¬ 
cularly at the time of the inundation, driving back the 
fand and foil perpetually brought down by the current 
of the Nile, produced a fediment of folid land now ninety 
leagues in circumference, which has been the work of 
ages*, and which, at fir(1 choking up the mouth of the ri¬ 
ver, divided its rivers into many lellerchannels, a] moft all 
of which now unite in the two branches that difembogue 
at Dsmietta and Rofetta. This phenomenon is denied 
by Bruce, and fome others; but the faff is incontro¬ 
vertible, and is exaflly of the fame feature with the di- 
vifion of the mouths of the Rhine, whole waters.forced 
down the new foil which formed the Belgic court, and 
eventually gave exiftence to the whole territory of Hol¬ 
land. For a fatisfaCtory explication of this operation of. 
Nature, fee the article Earth, p. 197, and 201, of this 
volume. 
The caufes and efFeCts of this phenomenon feem alfo 
to have been very ingenioully limplified by Vivant De- 
non. “ The Delta, (fays this writer,) appears to have 
been formed by the etforts made by the weight of the 
waters of the Nile againft the waves of the lea, which, 
at a certain feafon of the year, are impelled twelve hours 
daily by the north wind, in a direction oppolite to that 
of the courfe of the liver. Front this conflict of con¬ 
tending waters there refults a fand-bank, which, gradu¬ 
ally augmenting, becomes an ifland, and divides the cur¬ 
rent of the river, forming two branches, each of which 
has its diftinCt fhelf. The eddy of thefe fhelves throws 
on the beach a part of the land which the current had 
fwept along, and by this heaping up of fand the two 
branches narrow by degrees, until, one of them gaining 
an afcendancy over the other, the. weakeft of them is 
choked up, and the ifland becomes main land. The 
branch which remains foon forms another fank-bank, an 
ifland, two final 1 branches, and foon. In this way, it 
appears to me, the molt natural explanation may be given 
of the ancient geography of the branches of the Nile, as 
well as ot the voyage of Menelaus in Homer, and of the 
various changes of the Delta, the feite of which might 
in the fir ft inllance have been a gulf, then a fandy beach, 
and, laftly, a cultivated country, covered with towns, 
■villages, and abundant crops, and interfedted by canals, 
which, the loi! having been either drained or watered 
with fkill, might have difpenfed abundance over the 
whole of the furface of this new country. Afterwards, 
in the laple of time, and in confequence of the calamities 
infeparable front revolutions, fome of the parts of this 
territory, thus gained from the fea, may have been de- 
ferted, while others may have become faltfprings; and 
lakes may have been formed, next deftroyed, and, finally, 
reproduced under a new modification of matter. Canals, 
choked up, may have changed their courfe, and have 
been loft. If this be granted, why, in our uncertain re- 
fearches, need we enquire where the Bolbitine and Ca¬ 
nopic branches of the Nile, the branch of Berenice, &c. 
were fituated ? 
“ The plapts which are produced in the firft place on 
the new land, are three or four kinds of feu-weeds, round 
which the fand throws itfelf up in heaps. From its fur- 
face they fpring up afrefh ; and their fubfequent decay 
furnifhes a manure'which favours the vegetation of reeds. 
Thefe reeds give agreater elevation and a greater folidity 
to the foil. The date-tree now appears, and by its lhade 
prevents the Ridden evaporation of the moiflure, and ren¬ 
ders the foil fruitful and productive, as may be feen ill 
the environs of the fortrefs of Rofetta, from whence, in 
the time of the emperor Selim I. the guns had a full 
command of the fea, and which is now a league fro in the 
fea-fliore, furrounded by forefts of palm-trees, beneath 
the lhade of which other fruit-trees flourilb, together 
with all the vegetables that are produced in the belt cul¬ 
tivated gardens. 
“11a conjecture may be hazarded, we might fay, that, 
before the molt ancient times of which we have any know¬ 
ledge, the whole Delta was only a large gulf which re¬ 
ceived the waves of the Mediterranean.; that the Nile 
came as far as the opening of the valley which enters the 
province of Fay yum',; th.it by what is now called the dry 
river, it went to form the Mareotis, which was one of its 
eftuaries to the fea, as the lac Madie was that of the Ca¬ 
nopic branch, and as the lakes of Berelos and Menzaleh 
are ftill the eftuaries of the Sebenitic, Mendeiliai), Tanitic, 
and Pelufiac, mouths; that the lake Bahr-Belame, (or 
without water,) is the remain of the ancient courfe of 
this river, wherein are found petrifactions, vegetations, 
and human labours, fhewing that the foil has been raifed 
by the courfe of the river, and by the perpetual fluctua¬ 
tion of the lands from weft to eaft ; t hat the Nile, having 
at a certain period acquired more direction to the north 
than to the north-weft as before, precipitated itfelf into 
the gulf which we have juft: iuppofed, there forming 
marlhes,: and at laft, the Delta. From this hypothefis it 
would follow, that the fir ft labours of the ancient Egyp¬ 
tians, fuel) as the lake Moeris, now lake Bathen, and the 
firli dykes, were only made to retain part of the waters of 
the inundation, in order to irrigate thereby the province 
of Arfinoe, which threatened to become barren; and that 
pofteriorly, the lake Moeris, or Bathen, no longer receiv¬ 
ing water enough, nor being able from its fituation to 
water 
