Peeps at Many Lands: Egypt | Page 4

for the imposing offices of the Suez Canal Company, and the
fine statue to De Lesseps, recently erected on the breakwater, Port Said
has little else to excite the curiosity of the visitors; built upon a
mud-bank formed of Suez Canal dredgings, its existence is its most
interesting feature, and the white breakers of the Mediterranean, above
which it is so little raised, seem ever ready to engulf it as they toss and
tumble upon its narrow beach.
Leaving Port Said behind, the train travels slowly along the canal bank,
and we begin to enter Egypt.
On the right the quiet waters of Lake Menzala, fringed with tall reeds
and eucalyptus trees, stretches to the far horizon, where quaintly shaped
fishing-boats disappear with their cargoes towards distant Damietta.
Thousands of wild birds, duck of all kinds, ibis and pelican, fish in the
shallows, or with the sea-gulls wheel in dense masses in the air, for this
is a reservation as a breeding-green for wild-fowl, where they are
seldom, if ever, disturbed.
On the left is the Suez Canal, the world's highway to the Far East, and
ships of all nations pass within a stone's throw of your train. Between,
and in strange contrast with the blueness of the canal, runs a little
watercourse, reed fringed, and turbid in its rapid flow. This is the
"sweet-water" canal, and gives its name to one of our engagements
with Arabi's army, and which, from the far-distant Nile, brings fresh
water to supply Port Said and the many stations on its route.
To the south and east stretches the mournful desert in which the

Israelites began their forty years of wandering, and which thousands of
Moslems annually traverse on their weary pilgrimage to Mecca; while
in all directions is mirage, so perfect in its deception as to mislead the
most experienced of travellers at times.
Roaming over the desert which hems in the delta, solitary shepherds,
strangely clad and wild-looking, herd their flocks of sheep and goats
which browse upon the scrub. These are the descendants of those same
Ishmaelites who sold Joseph into Egypt, and the occasional
encampment of some Bedouin tribe shows us something of the life
which the patriarchs might have led.
In contrast with the desert, the delta appears very green and fertile, for
we are quickly in the land of Goshen, most beautiful, perhaps, of all the
delta provinces.
The country is very flat and highly cultivated. In all directions, as far as
the eye can see, broad stretches of corn wave in the gentle breeze, while
brilliant patches of clover or the quieter-coloured onion crops vary the
green of the landscape. The scent of flowering bean-fields fills the air,
and the hum of wild bees is heard above the other sounds of the fields.
Palm groves lift their feathery plumes towards the sky, and
mulberry-trees and dark-toned tamarisks shade the water-wheels, which,
with incessant groanings, are continually turned by blindfolded
bullocks. Villages and little farmsteads are frequent, and everywhere
are the people, men, women, and children, working on the land which
so richly rewards their labour.
The soil is very rich, and, given an ample water-supply, produces two
or three crops a year, while the whole surface is so completely under
cultivation that there is no room left for grass or wild flowers to grow.
Many crops are raised besides those I have already mentioned, such as
maize, barley, rice, and flax, and in the neighbourhood of towns and
villages radishes, cucumbers, melons, and tomatoes are plentifully
grown. Formerly wheat was Egypt's principal crop, but since its
introduction by Mohammed Ali in A.D. 1820, cotton has taken first
place amongst its products, and is of so fine a quality that it is the
dearest in the world, and is used almost entirely for mixing with silk or

the manufacture of sateen. Cotton, however, is very exhausting to the
soil, and where it is grown the land must have its intervals of rest.
No sooner is one crop gathered than yokes of oxen, drawing strangely
shaped wooden ploughs, prepare the land for another; and the newly
turned soil looks black against the vivid clover fields, in which tethered
cattle graze; while large flocks of sheep of many colours, in which
brown predominates, follow the ploughs and feed upon the stubble, for
the native is as economical as he is industrious.
Peopled by a race of born farmers, and in soil and climate provided by
Nature with all that could be desired for crop-raising, only rain is
lacking to bring the fields to fruition, and from the earliest times a great
system of irrigation has existed in Egypt. It is curious to see in many
directions the white lateen sails of boats which appear to be sailing over
the fields. In reality