ago it may be said that there were no Whitehouse, in search of the rea drainage channels in Egypt. Two Maris, found a very remarkable sauce years ago there were about one thou-shaped depression just south of th sand miles of such channels, some with Fayúm. We knew it could not hav beds as wide as sixty feet and flowing been Maris, because in its bed wa. deep enough to carry cargo boats, found no traces of a deposit of Niloti others with beds only three or four feet wide. I am glad to say by these means large tracts in Lower Egypt which had been abandoned as totally ruined have now been restored to cultivation. The level of the lake in the Fayúm was reduced by thirteen feet between 1885 and 1893, and most of the inundated lands around it have been again dried.

I have already mentioned the cruel hardship of the corvée, the serf army of eighty-five thousand men who were employed in the canal clearances from January to July, nearly half the year. I believe this institution was as old as the Pharaohs, and it was not easy to abolish it. But of course it went sorely against our British grain. Little by little we got money to enable us to pay our labor. By an annual outlay of £400,000 this spring corvée has entirely ceased since 1889, and now the Egyptian laborer carries out these clearances in as free a manner as his brother in Middlesex, and gets paid for his work.

Having thus, to the best of our powers, utilized the water in the river flowing past us, we turned our attention to the storage of the surplus waters. Without some such storage it is impossible to increase the cultivation during the Low Nile. All the water is used up. During High Nile there is always a great volume escaping useless to the sea.

mud, but it might be possible all the same to utilize it. The place was very carefully surveyed, and the project was estimated; but it was found that the cost of conveying the water into this basin would be so great that it was out of the question.

Attention was then turned to the possible sites where a stone dam might be built right across the river. The southern boundary of Egypt just now is near Wady Halfa, the second cata ract. It is no use going to look for sites south of this, for the country is in the hands of the Mahdi and his fierce. dervish soldiers. North of this point. unquestionably the best site, perhaps the only possible site is where the Nile valley is traversed by a broad dyke of hard Syenite granite, in passing over which the river forms its first cataract just south of Assouan. It is here divided into several channels between rocky islands, and no channel is deep, so that it would be easy to divert the water from one after another, to lay bare the bed of the river, and lay the foundations of the dam in the open air. It wants no engineer to understand what an advantage this is.

And the great dam, such as was designed by Mr. Willcocks, would have been a work worthy of the land of the Pyramids and Karnak a great wall of squared granite blocks - eighty-two feet thick at base, of a maximum height of one hundred and fifteen feet, There are two ways in which the a mile and a quarter long, pierced by water may be stored: either by throw- sluices large enough to allow of the ing a dam right across the river and whole Nile at highest flood rushing forming a great lake above it, or, if through. The lake formed would have such a place can be found, by diverting been one hundred and twenty miles the flood water into some suitable hol-long. Would this not have been a low, and drawing it off from there at work of some majesty to commemorate the season of low supply, as done by forever the English rule in Egypt—a Herodotus's celebrated Lake Moris. work one would have been proud to At one time there was a hope that such have had a hand in ? But it was not a storage basin might be found. An to be. The Egyptian saw no objection American gentleman, named Mr. Cope to it. The money could have been

Personally I accept the situation, for

found. But there was an insuperable obstacle created when, on the Island of I never believed that it would be sacrificed. But yet as an engineer I must sigh over the lost opportunity for England of making such a splendid reservoir. And as a friend to Egypt, I sigh still more that the country will not have such a splendid supply of water as would enable Upper Egypt to have the full benefits now possessed by Lower Egypt, and Lower Egypt to expand and flourish.

Phile, about 250 B.C., Ptolemy II. built temple to Isis, on the site of older buildings long disappeared. Round this temple other buildings clustered, built by Greeks and Romans. Those of you Tho have not seen them, are probably amiliar from pictures with the group of venerable buildings standing amidst palm-trees on the rocky island, and reflected in the waters below.

The reduced scheme will, however, be a great boon to the country, and I trust will now be put in hand without delay.

In 1884, when the expedition up the Nile was first being considered, I was asked by the general officer commanding in Egypt, whether I thought there

Had Ptolemy only built his temple. on the island of Elephantine, a few niles north, it would have been unaffected by the great dam, but Phile is just to the south, or up-stream side of where the great dam must necessarily ave come, and in consequence the sland, with its temples, would be drowned for about six months every was any possibility of the Mahdi Tear. You probably remember the diverting the river in the Soudan, and outburst of rage and indignation which depriving Egypt of its water. The late the announcement of this proposed Sir Samuel Baker was in Cairo at the desecration created in London last sum- | time, and I consulted him as to ber. It was not to be tolerated that whether he knew of any place in the England should commit such vandalso. In vain it was answered that the place belonged to Egypt, not to Engand-that the Egyptian, who was gain so much by the dam, cared absolutely nothing about Ptolemy and his temples that he was prepared to pay a large price for a great work to benefit his country. What business Was it of England to forbid him?

Nile valley where during highest flood the water spills off to the right or left, towards the Red Sea or the Libyan Desert. He said he was sure there was no such place, and I then told the general it would be impossible for the Mahdi to divert the Nile. I was sure that with his savages he would never dam up the low supply until its surface attained the height of flood supply, and if even then during flood there was no spill channel, Egypt was safe enough.

And it was not only the English who were indignant. For once, and only for once, I fear, since we occupied But what the Mahdi could not do, a Egypt in 1882, was educated opinion in civilized people could do. A governEngland and France at one.. Both ment official has no business to talk alike insisted that Phile should not politics, and the Royal Institution is be drowned. Nor must I admit had no place for politics; but I may be all the engineers that were interested allowed to point out an evident enough in the question the full courage of fact, that the civilized possessor of the their opinions. While they longed to Upper Nile valley holds Egypt in his build the dam, and lamented the per-grasp.

verse fate that had put Phile there, At this moment the Italians are on still they wished to spare Phile-and the eastern edge of that valley —a uatheir voice has prevailed. The majes- tion, I must say, who have been contie structure has been cut down twenty-sistently most friendly to us in Egypt. seven feet, and now will only be Supposing that they occupied Khareighty-eight feet high, and Phile will stand henceforth in a lake, but will Lever be drowned. LIVING AGE.

VOL. VI. 267

toum, the first thing they would naturally and very properly do would be to spread the waters of the Low Nile over

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the Soudan; and no nation in Europe | one-sixth of the amount received i understands irrigation so well. And the corresponding mouth last year, ane what then would become of Egypt's a large deficit is feared at the end of cotton crops? They could only be the quarter. The secretary of the secured by a series of the most costly Colonial and Continental Church So dams over the river, and the fate of ciety reports that every one is de Phile would surely be sealed. But pressed beyond description. There i more than this: a civilized nation on no labor for the poor because there i the Upper Nile would surely build reg- no money to pay for it. We are organ ulating sluices across the outlet of the izing relief parties to provide for the Victoria Nyanza, and control that great prevailing distress." A corresponden sea as Manchester controls Thirlemere. also states that the hungry and half This would probably be an easy oper-clad crowds are in a miserable condi ation. Once done, the Nile supply |tion, and what they need most is warn would be in their hands; and if poor clothing for the biting month of March little Egypt had the bad luck to be at The missionaries themselves are in a war with this people on the upper evil plight; as one of them pleads waters, they might flood them, or cut earnestly for an overcoat for himself off their water supply at their pleasure. and clothes for his children. In a Is it not evident, then, that the Nile climate where the thermometer is ofter from the Victoria Nyanza to the Medi- below zero in the winter, such tales o terranean should be under one rule ? hardship must elicit our warmest sym That time is perhaps far off. I con-pathy. clude what I have to say to-night, by Great as were the calamities and pri giving you the assurance, and I chal- vations that followed the great Mauri lenge contradiction, that at no time tian hurricane of April 29, 1892, they in the long history of Egypt under were, nevertheless, more endurable Pharaoh or Ptolemy, Roman or Arab than those of Newfoundland, for the or Turk, have the people of the country been so prosperous, or so justly ruled as during the last nine years.

From The Fortnightly Review. THE CRISIS IN NEWFOUNDLAND.

horrors of famine and starvation are largely mitigated in a warm and trop ical climate. The appeal to the charity of our philanthropists is great, and it is to be hoped that it will meet with a ready response. It is not long ago that a most destructive fire (July, 1892) de stroyed a large portion of St. John's. the capital of Newfoundland, and the centre of government. But now the colonists are faced with the more permanent and terrible evils of bankruptcy.

IT is rarely that a British colony, having once achieved responsible government, contemplates a return to the conditions of a crown colony. Yet, from the latest information to hand, it would appear that such a return is It is well known that the prosperity within the range of practical politics in of Newfoundland has always depended Newfoundland. The first step would upon the successful prosecution of one be the appointment of a Royal Com- industry, viz., the fishing industry. mission in the islaud to inquire into Newfoundland cod is considered supethe existing and most deplorable state rior to that caught off the coasts of of affairs, and although the govern- Scotland, Norway, Iceland, and the, ment is naturally averse to this, local Faroes. It is the task of the Newopinion, now thoroughly on the alert, is largely in favor of it. For some time past the colonists have been face to face with a most serious commercial crisis. The revenue for January is only thirty thousand dollars, being only

foundland fishermen to provide fish for Roman Catholic Europeans, for Bra zilians, and for the colonists of the West Indies, and the trade has fallen chiefly into the hands of a few capi talists.

The immediate cause of the present | niary straits, and Lord Grey, in his inancial disasters is accounted for in review of the colonial policy of Lord some quarters by the action of the John Russell's administration, detrustees of the estate of a London mer- scribes the pauperizing effect of gifts chant who carried on a large business made by this country to Newfoundland in Newfoundland. It was his custom in 1846-1847 in relief of losses by fire, to maintain the fish exporters by ac- hurricanes, aud the potatoe failure. cepting their drafts, but now the trus- At one time no less than one-fifth of lees of his property have refused to do the public revenue was absorbed in the this, and so the panic began, commu- necessary calls of charity and of poor icating itself with lightning rapidity relief. There have been few wealthy to all classes. There are only two residents and very little taxable propbanks, "The Union" and "The Com-erty in the island to fall back upon in mercial," having in circulation bank- times of an acute crisis. Generally notes to the value of one million four | speaking, the merchants who have hundred thousand dollars, but not suffi- made money out of the fishing industry cient in the way of specie to redeem have been non-resident monopolists hem. On December 10 last they living in London or Bristol. In addiclosed their doors, and a general panic tion to the natural uncertainty of the el in. It is clear that a colony that is harvest of the sea, the colonists of easily upset cannot boast of a very Newfoundland have frequently been table equilibrium. The system of compelled to face complications arising anking as it prevails in our colonies is from a foreign policy over which they not exactly that which finds favor with have exercised no control. Indeed, anking institutions in England, and from this cause no British colony has erhaps it can hardly be expected that experienced greater vicissitudes. should be similar. Land mortgages e a favorite kind of investment in the bionies, and in many instances coloal banks have ample security and a ir margin if only time be given for alizing. But, in a panic of a few ays, the best calculations may be upset and bankers forced to close their joors.

Just one hundred years ago the Newfoundland merchants were setting forth before a committee of the House of Commons in 1793, the decline of the fisheries, but no sooner were their complaints uttered than a season of unexampled prosperity set in which lasted from 1793 to the peace of 1814. During this period our colonists, reIn colonies where there are many lieved from French and American strings to the colonist's bow, and many competition, pursued their trade unsources of agricultural and mineral challenged and untrammelled along the Tealth, it is evident that recovery, whole seaboard, and princely fortunes either complete or partial, is merely a were amassed in a few years by people question of time. A certain number of who entered the trade without any capspeculative bubbles are pricked and ital. Some well-known houses netted sound securities exposed, and there £20,000, £30,000 and even £60,000 per a general clearing of the financial annum, but of this enormous profit mosphere, not without some salutary scarcely a single penny was invested effects. But in a colony of one in- in the island of Newfoundland. The dustry only, and this a somewhat pre- merchants and speculators withdrew, carious one, as in Newfoundland, the and the peace with France and Amerdifficulties of banking must be excep- ica caused a complete revulsion of nally embarrassing. For where, trade. A crisis arose and the large indeed, are the investments which population that was attracted to the promise ample security and quick real- island in prosperous times were ization? posed to bankruptcy and ruin. Again It is not the first time that New- there was a cry for help to the impefoundland has found herself in pecu-rial government, and through the solic

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itations of the merchants, a select | industry. The country, therefore, i committee of the House of Commons likely to remain "a wilderness for was appointed to inquire into the state ever," because the French have a right of the trade of Newfoundland and into to fish upon the coast, and object te the situation of that settlement. The the slightest interference. He put the merchants could only suggest one of situation forcibly when he remarked two alternatives, a bounty on the "The sovereignty of the island fisheries to enable the British to com- Newfoundland is in the queen; but i pete on equal terms with the French this be the construction of the treaties aud Americans, or the transportation far better is it to possess a right o wholesale of the population elsewhere. fishing four or five months in the year From the report it would appear that than to be sovereign of the soil. there was little promise of agricultural the one hand we are crushed by the development, and no mention is made French bounties, and on the other the of possible mineral resources at that aggressions of the French on the west date. The distress of Newfoundland ern shore prevent us from developing is of a periodic if not of a chronic one-half the island. I will mention order, and, in spite of recent efforts of one or two examples. A gentleman Newfoundland politicians to improve has a tract of land in which there are the position of their country, the inev-seams of coal, and he was forming a itable crash has come. Candid critics company to work it; but the moment affirm that for the past ten years there the discovery was made that the coal has been an annual deficit; that the deposit could only be reached from the civil service is extravagant, and there treaty coast, and that the grants would has been a somewhat premature ambi-be clothed with the conditions to tion to construct a railway of five hun- which I have referred, then those who dred miles, which will inflict a burden were allowed to form the company deof fourteen million dollars upon a pop-clined to do so, and the land remains a ulation of two hundred thousand. waste. Again, a gentleman on the

working was discontinued. A factory for the canning of lobsters was erected by an Englishman on the coast. The factory was ordered to be taken down, and he had no redress; yet, soon after, he had the mortification of witnessing a French factory erected under the instructions of a British officer, and in the very locality from which his own

In addition to their troubles, the coast discovered a valuable lead-mine, Newfoundlanders have a special griev-and sank a shaft within about three ance in the "French Shore Right," | hundred yards of the coast. No which is none the less irritating be- Frenchman had ever fished within the cause it has been going on for nearly neighborhood, but a remonstrance was two hundred years. Along seven hun-made by the French government that dred miles of the deeply indented New-the working of this mine might in some foundland coasts, from Cape St. John way affect the French fishery, and the to Cape Ray, the French claim a right of landing for the purpose of curing and drying their fish. In a discussion on Inter-British Trade and its Influence on the Unity of the Empire, before a meeting of the fellows of the Royal Colonial Institution (1890–91), Sir William Whiteway, the present premier and attorney-general of the new government, made some pertinent obser- property had been removed." vations. The French Shore Rights Apropos of the lobster trade, a curiinterfere practically with colonial de-ous natural history point was raised as velopment. The only access to the to whether a lobster was a "" fish or best mineral regions is on the western not, and an appeal was made to the coast, and here the French bar the scientific knowledge of Sir William way. No capitalist, he remarked, will Flower, who certainly excluded lobsters invest money under the present irri- from the class of fish according to the tating conditions of opening up a new modern naturalists' definition, although,