Agriculture -- Egypt; Egypt -- Description and travel
Take one point alone. The increase in the cotton crop of Egypt would be
most extensive, and its value enormous. Then there is the land itself.
Here we have so many extra acres, only partially irrigated, but which by
this raising of the supply of water will be changed from partial supply
land into constant--that is, each acre will be enabled to tap the
reservoirs at all times of the year, according to the cultivator's need,
with the consequent rise in value of the land of thirty pounds per
feddan, or acre; and that means, according to Sir William Willcocks, an
increase in the wealth of Egypt to the extent of sixty million pounds.
From one bold stroke! Sixty million pounds for the expenditure of five.
Not bad, this, for the engineers. But still, it is but the beginning
of what may be done in the Khedive's country, for it is full of
suggestions to be carried out by an enterprising people for the making
of the native and those of our own country who are prepared to look far
ahead. The amount of land to be reclaimed is enormous; and what land!
For countless ages the Nile has flowed down, bringing with it its
fertile mud, depositing some by the way, carrying other some out to sea,
to be lost in the depths of the Mediterranean; but still, as time rolled
on, adding to, and raising higher, the huge Delta through which the
various mouths made their way; so that in these lowest portions of Egypt
the depth of rich soil must be enormous.
Here lie the lakes and canals of olden formation, shallowed and choked
with mud, and rendered almost impassable for transit, but only waiting
for the engineers to contrive modern works, the result of survey and
level, feeding canals and the forming of reservoirs to supply irrigation
water for freeing the land of its salt, making easy the navigation of
the district, and simplifying the conveyance of its grain and other
crops.
All this development is awaiting enterprise and capital low down in the
Delta. But the engineers have not stopped near home and the Khedive's
capital; they have cast their eyes afar across that vast extent of
barbarism, the re-conquered Soudan, where, bordering upon the Nile, it
is often "water, water everywhere, and not a drop" for the crops to
drink.
Sir William Garstin has been busy here, surveying and examining what can
be done towards and beyond Khartoum. Here rich tracts of fertile land
are lying on both sides of the Blue Nile, to the extent, roughly
speaking, of some three millions of acres. This land of Upper Egypt is
as rich in its capabilities as that of the Delta; but it has qualities
which the latter does not possess, and is more suitable for the
production of excellent cotton, which can be sown as a flood crop and
reaped in winter, an advantage which the seasons will not permit in
Egypt.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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