=Agriculture and Cattle-breeding.=—By far the larger part of the population of Egypt and the Egyptian Sûdân has been for many thousands of years past connected with the cultivation of the soil and the rearing of cattle, and on the success of the =farmer= and the =cattle-breeder= the prosperity of the whole country has always depended. In remote ages, before the estuary of the Nile was filled up by the mud which came down in flood-time from the mountains of Ethiopia and Nubia, and while still the sea flowed up the Nile as far as Esna, the primitive Egyptians were shepherds and herdsmen. The great cattle-breeding district was situated in the neighbourhood of the country now called Dâr Fûr, or the “Home of the Fûrs,” and even to the present day the exportation of the beautiful cattle of the district forms a very important item of Sûdân trade. The natives who lived by breeding cattle were called by the Egyptians “Menti,” _i.e._, “=cattle-men=,” and their modern descendants are called “Baḳḳârah,” which also means “cattle-men.” In all times they have been a wild and lawless folk, ferocious, blood-thirsty, and cruel. The early cattle-men worshipped the =bull=, and this animal played a prominent part in later Egyptian mythology. Several kinds of bulls were worshipped in Egypt: =Apis= at Memphis, =Mnevis= at Heliopolis, and =Bachis= at Hermonthis, and one of the greatest of the titles of Osiris was “Bull of Ȧmentet,” or “Bull of the Other World.” The =cow= also was worshipped under the name of Hathor, and a flint cow-head in the British Museum (Table-case M in the Third Egyptian Room) proves that her cult dates from the latter part of the Neolithic Period. The paintings on the walls of early tombs show that several kinds of cattle were known to the Egyptians, and the inscriptions make it clear that the old feudal lords and gentry of Egypt devoted much attention to cattle-breeding, and that they made a regular trade of it. (See the models of cows in the Wall-cases on the Landing of the North-West Staircase, No. 140, and the wall painting in Standard-case I in the Third Egyptian Room.) =Oxen= and =cows= were fattened like the smaller animals and geese, and, before they were turned out for the season into the deserts to browse upon the growth which followed the rains, they were branded, or marked in some way with their owner’s name. [Illustration: The bull Ḥāp (Apis), with the triangular blaze on his forehead, and the scarabs, etc., on his back. [Table-case H, Third Egyptian Room.]] [Illustration: The bull Mer-ur (Mnevis). [Table-case H, Third Egyptian Room.]] [Illustration: Flint Cow’s head. [No. 86, Table-case M, Third Egyptian Room.]]