In clearing this Sudd and reopening the channels, the first step is to cut down the vegetation. The sponge-like mass is then cut with long saws into blocks, much as ice is harvested on our ponds. The blocks are pulled out into the current by steel cables attached to the engines on the steamers and float down the stream. An immense deal of this kind of work is going on all along the Upper Nile, for it is only in this way that navigation is kept open. I have met some of the surveyors who are breaking a way through the Sudd. They describe it as a vast sheet of brilliant green made up of papyrus, feathery reeds, and sword grass. These rise from five to fifteen feet above the water and are broken here and there by patches of ambatch trees and by channels, pools, and lagoons. The greater part of the region has no human inhabitants, especially that along the Bahr el Ghazal. Big game is to be seen only to the south of the swamp area. There the land is a little higher, and elephants, giraffes, and buffaloes inhabit the edges of the swamps. In the heart of it, in fact, in all parts of it, there are vast numbers of hippopotami, and there are all sorts of swamp birds everywhere. From the reeds and the mud banks clouds of wild cranes, geese, storks, herons, pelicans, and ducks of every description rise up as the boats approach, and there are insects by millions—mosquitoes, moths, spiders, and flies. There are other insects that carry fevers, and the tsetse fly, which causes the sleeping sickness. When all the Upper Nile plans and projects have been put through, the whole river will indeed be a magically powerful, yet tamed and harnessed, domestic animal at the command of the farmers of a greater Egypt and a greater Sudan. CHAPTER XVII STEAMING THROUGH THE LAND OF CUSH For the last two days I have been steaming through one of the oldest lands of the globe. I have been travelling up the Nile through the country which belonged to Noah’s grandson, Cush, who was Ham’s eldest son, and which was known to the Greeks and Romans in later days as Ethiopia. The Egyptians called it Nubia, from their word _noub_, which means gold, and it is known that a large part of the gold of ancient time came from it. Ancient Nubia had a considerable population, and was noted for its riches and power. It was already a flourishing country about the time of the Pyramid builders, while in the most prosperous days of Old Egypt it had large towns and magnificent temples dedicated to the worship of the Egyptian gods. On my way here I passed Abu Simbel, a great temple on the bank of the Nile, which was cut out of the rocks by Rameses II, the Pharaoh of the Bible. Farther down the river lies the Temple of the Lions, where that same old king was himself worshipped as a god.