THE NILE CATARACTS. 
515 
ridges of granite crop up through the sandstone desert, crossing the 
bed of the Nile, and producing a ridge, or series of ridges and rocks, 
in the channel of the river; these obstacles sometimes extend over 
miles of continuous water, at other places they are short and abrupt, 
and immediately above and below them the river is smooth and navig¬ 
able. But however they may differ as to length and nature, the rock 
that makes them is always granite, sometimes black, as at the second 
cataract, sometimes red, as. at the first cataract, sometimes of green 
colour. Worn smooth by the action of the water, the sides of these 
cataract rocks are polished as a marble chimney-piece, and their teeth¬ 
like ridges below the water are dangerous to any craft that touches 
them. When the Nile is in flood it runs with tremendous force, but 
comparative smoothness, down these rugged stairways, but, as the 
waters subside, the rocks begin to show their heads, the angle of descent 
becomes steeper, and channels of broken water begin to show them¬ 
selves where, before, the river from shore to shore had been an 
unbroken volume ; then is reached the stage of water, which is easier 
of ascent to a small boat, but more difficult of descent; for a small 
boat, propelled by oars or poles, or moved by sails, or dragged by tow 
ropes, can in these lower stages zig-zag from rock to rock, or eddy to 
eddy, while the force of the current is not so determined and continuous 
against her, but in descent it is the other way; when the Nile is in full 
flood, it has submerged almost all rocks beneath its waves, and the 
boat, left to the current, is swept along the broad river with great 
velocity, but with the safety to which the Roman philosopher, already 
quoted, has borne testimony. 
It is at the Second Cataract, immediately south of Wady Haifa, that 
the real impediments to the navigation of the Nile begin. This 
cataract is some nine miles in length, having a total descent of about 
60 feet in that distance. 
It undoubtedly forms the most serious interruption to traffic in the 
entire distance between Wady Haifa and Dongola. There are ten 
“ gates,” or bad bits in its length, and of these the “ Bab-el-Kebir ” is 
a very formidable obstacle. 
Twenty six miles further south is the cataract of Semmeh, the old 
frontier of Egypt in the reign of Thothmes. A very striking scene 
it is. 
The mountains closely approach the bank on either side, and on the 
summit of each overhanging cliff stands a ruined temple. Beneath 
these bordering rocks the river pours its volume, here pent to narrow 
limits between a great barrier of rock midway in the channel and the 
eastern and western shores. 
From the summit of the ruin-crowned cliff on the east shore the 
eye ranges far over the wilderness of the Batn el Hagr —“ The Womb 
of Rocks ”—a region which for 60 miles presents on every side the 
extreme aspect of desert desolation. 
In these 60 miles occur the large cataracts of Ambigol, Tangoor, and 
Dal, besides many smaller rapids, or “ shillals,” as the Arabs call them, 
places where the river makes a noise. Once the cataract of Dal is 
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