Show 1 I Twentieth Century Egypt VIII The Waters of the thc Nile I IBY BY FREDERIC J HASKIN I Cairo Egypt An ancient Egyptian proverb says sye P The Nile me is 18 Egypt and agypt B pt te Is UM the UI NIle Kile Standing by b the amiGa of G b and looking across acro 8 the thelle Nile lle valley one realizes the significance of the proverb A narrow strip of at dark green runs like a ribbon between the th brown slopes elopes rf l 1 the desert From the tho heart of Africa OODles conies the lifeblood of till tillable tillable tillable able and aud tenantable Egypt If the river should Mould cease to flow the encroaching sands sa ck of Sahara would soon blot out from the map amp the square miles of allu alluvial alluvial alluvial vial land that from rom a practical stand standpoint point nt constitute the whole of Egypt Egy t That there to Is no ne danger da r of such a catastrophe catas catastrophe troph is bJ due to the fact tact that the Nile Nh if Is supplied at its ftc It source from equatorial lakes fed by Abyssinian rivers Unlike a number of American rivers whose volume volum IB Is to agriculture and navigation navigation tion the Nile rises in 10 a region where the forests forest have not been cut for lumber lumbar lum r Geologists say that a prehistoric fis fissure fissure sure lure in the earth extending from the tile southern rn shore chore of the tho Mediterranean U lo oJ what Is now the first cataract of the Nile Kite brought a flow of or silt salt water into what Is I now Egypt Sediment from rivers flow flowing lag ing from higher ground into this fissure fi eure gradually filled nil it Its bottom raisins raising It to toa toft a II higher level Volcanic disturbances la In central Africa so changed chanced the surface of Uw the earth that thac the courses of tropical t 1 streams stream were wert changed and an enormous head of water found an outlet toward the north from the th lakes and swamp swamps of the south moth The high plateaus plateau have Peen been since that time drained toward the Mediterranean Mediterranean Mediterranean and fresh water has flowed for thousands thoU of years ear through the trough once filled with a salty flood AH Alt of this took place pines before fore the beginning of or the history of the human race rece The marvel marvelously marvelously fertile soil of Egypt has lias yielded crops tIO since the tle t of agriculture As far back backas as the reign cf of the earliest Egyptian King Menes Irrigation has been employed to lead the water to the field fields If it tradition speaks the truth Upon the Island of Rhoda upon the shores of which Moses 1 was found by b Pharaohs daughter the Egyptian of to today today today day shows the traveler the tue which registers register the dally daily dall stages of the river at Cairn Cairo These records ros have Me been bemi b n kept for years yean He Is rising or he Is falling failing say M the tb Arabs the explorations of its it sources have re revealed revealed revealed the causes eau of the rising and fall fail fallIng failIng fallIng Ing of the Nile Ie the stream is still spoken of or by the Arabs almost almo t as If it were a deity The year Mr divided In other countries int into seasons Is divided here by the flue fluctuations of the Nile NUe The months of in inundation Inundation or Nil NIU are from froni August to November The winter r or is De Do December D I comber cember to March The lowest t season eason is h 1 1 the he summer called Sen from rom April to the end of July In the Nil NII valley there I is no occasion for the cartoonist or hu humorist to discuss the of or winter In n the lap of spring Nor does Seti Sen lin linger ger per in the lap of 0 Nili Nih III The rising and fall fallIng fallIng Ing ng of the thc Nile is III much more regular than the tile coming and going of the seasons where here they the are reckoned reckon according a to the position of nf the sun aun and it ithe he temperature or according to the rainfall lI lIIn In America the rivers rl rise e in the late la te winter or nr early 11 spring as a rule and al alway always ways way during a period of ot heavy rains When the tm Ohio or Mississippi Is out of the banks the cause cau e of the flood Is evi evl evident dent t Father r Nile Kile ris rW s at the time when wn other rivers are depleted depicted and conies comes conis I pouring out nt ot It horsing desert under a blazing sun lIun to fertilize the fields of or Up tp Upper per Egypt It Is easy cas to o understand why wh the Egyptians who wao hud had never the Interior beyond be the tho H desert regarded the annual flood as an inexplicable mys mystery tery try The Tbt fellah fella stops upon the shores of the river the th banks of tt Il canal or 01 an Ir Irrigation irrigation ditch and coops Pf up a drink I from the th Nil in his hollowed d hand hands Th tourist t who dresses d for dinner at his hotel botel drinks Nile water unless he ie prefers wine or bottled d water watH from Europe Every animal and sod every e plant Ilant In the Nile valley valle Is dependent upon the same source for its tut supply of moisture There are no nowell wells well or o The great river three fifths of a mile wide at Cairo where It ItIs ItIs itIs Is flecked fl by the whit s sub ils of boats boat that suggest the pattern of the barges of the Pharaoh Pharaohs has no below blow the mouth of or the which is lO miles from the sea a Throughout this much of or its entire length which is 4 e miles or but fifty fUt miles mlle less lees 1 than that of th Mississippi the river flows through n a desert trans formed Into a garden by water diverted from the stream For thousands of years yeatS Egypt has hall blossomed as II the th rose roee because volcanic upheavals sent the torrents of Contra Central Africa toward the Mediterranean sea The practicality of Irrigation in the ark arid areas of the American west was wa singularly enough doubted by many man Americans American some so years ago although the pyramids were by b a II race whose antecedents II fed by converting dry sand send Into farming land Advocates of o reforesting denuded areas ardS about the sources of American rivers now more or less 1 reduced during the summer as a a result of a depletion of aLex stor storage age reservoirs re ay say It tt Is I possible po tWe to regu regulate regulate regulate late the variation of 0 the tbt volume of a river rier by regulating Its source of supply They The believe lIe that the area of forests so directly affects the volume of a II stream that it might be possible po to create a river In an arid hill hili country by hy doming the hills with timber It Is bJ interesting to reflect that the sources of the Nile are In a II region where there has haa been no civil civilization civilIsation and anel HO no deforestation lie Its I rising and falling failing remain as a regular today as they were many centuries ago From Prom the bridge that connects Cairo proper with the Island of or from the deck of a the Nile looks yellow causing the American or European tu tv whom Nile Nil green has been a familiar phrase since his hie child childhood childhood hood b Od to express surprise e The water Is Isgreen isgreen green at one time In the year Just be M before before fore the annual inundation green water wiLey wa tn arrives It Is offensive to the taste and has a bad odor It Is 1 welcomed only olliT bo boo because cause of it Its significance High Nile Is bJ preceded by bt heavy beay rains rain trib tributaries tributaries It was wag formerly believed that the tIN appearance of green een water in Egypt meant that decaying vegetable matter matt from the swamps swamp of Uganda was swept w pt down the ahead of the Deed Now it has been decided by b investigators that green water te Is due to the prence pr ellee of a II microscopic vegetable growth similar to seaweed which forms In hi the tropical al riv nv rivers ers era rs As A ton Ion long M as this th growth drifts north northward northward northward ward in clear cliar water wat r It Increases In vol volume VOlume ume time and It H sum tt lea covers coveys the river for fot too lO miles ben the flood brings rin muddy water the growth is 18 killed and ana swept down stream Nature has ha fortunately distributed the rainfall In Central Africa M so that water supply 8 In Is fed Into the tile Nile as 8 it la Is needed The Sobet flood rises in April Apri and is Ia felt at Khartoum late in May rhe The rains continue tilt till November and the crest reaches Khartoum In September The Blue Nile NIl begins to rise early In July and e It little later the rises rise It baa has been estimated that If the floods from these thes three sources poured Into the Nile simultaneously about tons tOM of or water wal would pass 1 each second at high Nile This would render storage and perennial Irrigation more difficult than It Is The problem of irrigating Egypt upon modern modem scientific plans is III somewhat aim sim simplified Im by the fact that the Nile is 18 more regular In its fluctuations than any other river Along its course th the unexpected unx rarely occurs yet there ar are wr periods of tow Nile during 1 agri agni agriculture agriculture culture suffers The years ean 1 JIoIO W to Lu w were e years year of poor floods The lIO Inundation inundatIon dation d ton was Will one of the t poorest e r re recorded recorded recorded corded It t is III compared by y Egyptian farm farmers ers ero to that of 1877 1077 but because of superior methods of irrigation the famine of iii j was not repeated Sir den Gorst sue suc successor cessor or of the Earl of Crosser Cramer as British consul con ul general says that there could co ld Be Beno beno beno no better Illustration of the progress made Blatte In the direction of minimizing the th effects of a poor p br be flood than the tact fact that about ten t n times as a much tillable soil soli was ar an by a lack of water In 1877 as In 1107 ll 7 As In ancient times Urn Egypt Is the Nile Modem Modern irrigation by enlarging the scope of the influence of the river has hes enlarged Egypt Seven successive low in the th eleventh century like the seven lIeven lean kine of Pharaohs dream meant famine Even Xv the caliphs family fled to Syria By for refuge refuse and human flesh was eaten by b th the people The seven soven se en low tow Niles preceding the satisfactory flood or Of 1908 1 did not cause rause catastrophe Improve Improvements e ments menta in irrigation will doubtless make fat kine of the years to come even when Father lather Nil falls to bestow liberal Hoods floods flOO ts upon the soil right 1900 1908 by Frederic J Tomorrow Twentieth Century Egypt IX lx Arresting the Tears of Isis lite |