尼罗河的一个D ITS DAMS.

尼罗河的一个D ITS DAMS.

WITHOUT the Nile and its beneficent irrigation Egypt would be a wilderness, as, indeed, it has become in many places, owing to the neglect of ages. Under the Pharaohs the country, then at the zenith of its power, was intersected in all directions with canals, which irrigated the land. In course of time, however, the canals were filled up with the drifting sand from the desert, and the country was abandoned. Yet, during its progress through lower Egypt, the river gathers a vast quantity of rich sediment, which for centuries has been allowed to flow, nuused and wasted, into the Mediterranean to the amount of billions of tons of valuable alluvial soil, which, in the shape of silt, was formerly distributed over the deserts, which were thus converted into fertile fields. The British government is doing its best to cause this to be the case again, and is taking the proper means to store the Mood waters of the Nile, and once more to Irrigate the desert lands.

For this purpose have been built two enormous dams—one at Assouan ;*the other at Assiout—the first attempt at BO doing having been made several years ago by some French engineers, who constructed a dam near Cairo. This proved practically a failure, owing to the lack of care displayed in the erection of the barrier and its instability. Its collapse and the consequent flooding of miles of the country would have ensued, had it not been for the prompt action of the British engineers, who strengthened the structure sufficiently to avoid such a catastrophe.