SEDIMENT OF THE NILE. 
438 
until it finds a resting place in the northeastern angle of the 
Mediterranean.* Thus the earth loosened by the rude Abys¬ 
sinian ploughshare, and washed down by the rain from the 
hills of Ethiopia which man has stripped of their protecting 
forests, contributes to raise the plains of Egypt, to shoal the 
maritime channels which lead to the city built by Alexander 
near the mouth of the Nile, and to fill up the harbors made 
famous by Phenician commerce. 
* 44 The stream carries this mud, &c., at first farther to the east, and 
only lets it fall where the force of the current becomes weakened. This 
explains the continual advance of the land seaward along the Syrian coast, 
in consequence of which Tyre and Sidon no longer lie on the shore, but 
some distance inland. That the Nile contributes to this deposit may easily 
be seen, even by the unscientific observer, from the stained and turbid 
character of the water for many miles from its mouths. A somewhat 
alarming phenomenon was observed in this neighborhood in 1801, on board 
the English frigate Romulus, Captain Culverhouse, on a voyage from Acre 
to Abukir. Dr. E. D. Clarke, who was a passenger on board this ship, 
thus describes it: 
“ 4 26th July.—To-day, Sunday, we accompanied the captain to the 
wardroom to dine, as usual, with his officers. "While we were at table, 
we heard the sailors who were throwing the lead suddenly cry out: 
44 Three and a half! ” The captain sprang up, was on deck in an instant, 
and, almost at the same moment, the ship slackened her way, and veered 
about. Every sailor on board supposed she would ground at once. Mean¬ 
while, however, as the ship came round, the whole surface of the water 
was seen to be covered with thick, black mud, which extended so far that 
it appeared like an island. At the same time, actual land was nowhere to 
be seen—not even from the masthead—nor was any notice of such a shoal 
to be found on any chart on board. The fact is, as we learned afterward, 
that a stratum of mud, stretching from the mouths of the Nile for many 
miles out into the open sea, forms a movable deposit along the Egyptian 
coast. If this deposit is driven forward by powerful currents, it some¬ 
times rises to the surface, and disturbs the mariner by the sudden appear¬ 
ance of shoals where the charts lead him to expect a considerable depth 
of water. But these strata of mud are, in reality, not in the least dangerous. 
As soon as a ship strikes them they break up at once, and a frigate may 
hold her course in perfect safety where an inexperienced pilot, misled by 
his soundings, would every moment expect to be stranded.’ ” — Bottger, 
T)as Mittelmeer, pp. 188, 189. 
* 
28 
