The ascent of the Nile—Importance of the river to Egypt—The appearance of the banks—The oasis of Fiyoom, the site of the ancient Crocodilopolis and of Arsinoe—One of the Edens of Egypt—Legends and traditions—Ismail's great estates here, now the property of the bondholders—Something more about the fellah and his customs—The most important men in Egypt—Adherence to ancient customs—Millions of dollars spent by Ismail in introducing machinery and improvements—Needs of Egyptian farming.
ON my first visit to Egypt it was a difficult enterprise to make a trip up the Nile. Now the facilities are perfect. One method is by the slow diahbeeyah, a boat fitted up as luxuriously as a drawing-room, in which the traveller can float in delicious indolence, without danger of meeting an acquaintance, or experiencing a single ripple of disturbance to mar his dreams. The other method is by a well-conducted and comfortable steamer. The first method of travel takes about three months, the latter about three weeks ; and though the diahbeeyah has a certain delicious charm of its own, the majority of travellers prefer the steamer. The present age of tourists is too restless to waste three months, even on the most interesting of rivers. Though old Father Nile has so great a history and is nearly as long as any river in the world, yet it is only during a short season that it is navigable for any great distance.
As soon as it stops raining at the Equator and in Abyssinia the surplus water runs out into the sea or is absorbed by the thirsty lands along the river. Even during the winter season, when travellers ascend, it becomes necessary to tie up at night to keep from grounding on sandbars, and sometimes during the day the boat must be pulled off by other steamers. At Cairo in the month of May there is only six feet of water ; in October there is twenty-six, and this is the beginning of the season for navigation. The Nile begins to rise about the 17th of June, when the Egyptians believe a miraculous drop of water falls from heaven during the night and causes it to rise. About the 10th of August it is high enough to irrigate the lands, and it is then that the great ceremony of cutting the dam of the canal, called the Khalig, near Cairo, a thing of immemorial usage, takes place. The Khedive and all Egypt are present when this is done, amid great rejoicing, firing of cannon, brilliant illumination, and fireworks. The Nile is then covered with boats filled with people, who remain up all night to enjoy the picturesque spectacle. Upon this occasion the ancient Egyptians were accustomed to appease the god of the Nile and induce him to bestow a bountiful inundation by throwing as a sacrifice into its sacred water a beautiful virgin. A manikin was substituted by the early Christians ; the Arabs build one now of the Nile mud inside of the dam, which is swept away by the rush of the water when it is cut.
My last voyage up the Nile was on a steamer ; the other way, in a diahbeeyah, was too much like crossing the North American plains in an ambulance when there is a railroad to transport one over the vast uninhabited country. For many miles the banks are monotonous, and it is only those who like the dolce far niente who travel in the diahbeeyah. With an agreeable party a few weeks among the ruins is as long as one cares to linger, unless he is an Egyptologist, deep in the study of the ancients. The voyager is always glad when he gets through with his trip, even on a steamer. Before making the long ascent it is pleasant to take rail to the Fiyoom, an oasis a short distance from the Nile, 65 miles above Cairo. Its important town, Medeenet, is interesting, as it is built upon the ruins of the famous city of Crocodilopolis, afterward called Arsinoe. Some think the Hebrews were forced to labor here in constructing its great monuments, and that the patriarch Joseph was buried here before being carried by his people to the Holy Land. Every place in Egypt has its incident. The tradition among the Copts is that Arsinoe was once destroyed by the enemy tying torches to the tails of cats and running them into the city, which was soon in flames. It would be difficult, with even this wonderful device, to burn down the new city, as it is almost entirely built of mud. This plateau, situated in the Libyan hills, surrounded by deserts, is an oval basin 25 or 30 miles in extent each way, and from its luxuriant cultivation may be truly said to be the land of roses. It is intersected by canals, and wherever the eye is directed the lofty minarets mark an Arab village. In ancient times there were nearly a million acres planted in this oasis, but it is greatly reduced now, though the bondholders have control of over 100,000 acres belonging to Egypt, which they have seized to help pays its debt. It is a great fruit region, is celebrated for its cereals, and it was here that Cleopatra obtained the beautiful flowers for her magnificent banquets. It is now remarkable for its sugar-cane, and cotton of modern introduction, and for many of those stupendous mills and refineries of which so much has been written apropos of the extravagance of the Khedive, Ismail. An epitome of Egypt is here in all its phases. Wending one's way along the banks of the canal, one can always see the traditional Arab on his homar (ass), with his red tarboosh (fez) over his bronzed face. He is tall of stature, with broad chest, the pride of race indicated in his face, with large almond eyes, and dressed in his blue chemise, while two pointed slippers are stuck up in the air, partly to escape the ground and partly to keep them on his feet, for he never wears heels. His better half, with her blue habarah thrown over her, concealing her head and face and draping her erect and graceful form (the same fashionable dress as that of the man), wears rings in her nose and flowers pricked in blue on her chin, between her eyes, on her arms, and on the back of her hands to imitate gloves. The palms of her hand, her finger-nails, toe-nails, and the bottoms of her feet are stained with henna, giving them a dingy color of dirty brown. Even with her the coquetry of silver bracelets and anklets is fully displayed. To add still more to the man's proof of the superiority of his sex, while he rides she is often seen to carry on her head a heavy load which balances itself, one child straddling her shoulders and another her side, the latter one being held on with her gracefully turned arm. Yet with all this habitual load, when young she is the perfection of form, and her hands and feet are well pointed and pretty. Thus you have a common picture of the fellah and his interesting spouse. The fellah takes pride in showing complete disregard of the human beast of burden trudging alongside him under the weight of his progeny. Not only thus, but in conversation among men he expresses a contempt for women. If the matter is ever spoken of, which is seldom, he never fails to let you know his pride of sex ; but in this as a rule he is an arrant imposter, for women everywhere must sometimes have their say. In private life he does the best he can to treat his wife kindly, and in the mud hut she is evidently the reigning sovereign. I never entered a village wherein I did not hear her lashing her lord with the most fearful abuse and banging his children without mercy. No doubt the hardships of maternity and labor sour her good-nature, and as man is largely responsible for them, I never have heard her outcries without delight, though I always felt sorry for the poor miserable little naked beings who get the severest punishment for their peccadilloes. In looking closer at the fellah, who really thinks he is the “ salt of the earth,” one is not sorry that the poor soul has some small gratification in his hard lot. When stripped of the little glory that invests him, and he is seen divested of all clothing except the yellow camel's-hair tarboosh upon his shaven head, laboring in the broiling sun of Egypt, while standing up to his knees in the alluvium of the Nile, my heart has always gone out to him. Talk of slavery in any other country compared with that of the fellah ! The former slaves of America lived in palaces and dressed in fine linen in comparison. Having a horror of war, from long oppression the fellah acts with pusillanimity ; he will not defend himself unless he lives in a city and comes in contact with Europeans. As a rule he never strikes back, but always makes a great noise with those of his race who cross his path. Rarely coming to blows, they pull each other's beard when excited, which is considered a very great insult. If told that Allah does not like it, the disputants are glad to kiss and make friends. Robbery, unless of trifles, and murder and assassination are almost unknown. They have a horror of taking the life of even a bird. This man of all work, though owning the soil, receives little for his labor, as what is not taken by the bondholder is seized by the official, leaving him but a scanty supply to subsist upon ; or, as a writer of the new Egypt tells us, “ Unless he gives the last piastre, the sceptre of old Egypt” is applied to obtain it ; becoming accustomed to the kourbash, he rather likes it, and begs as a great happiness to see his wife and children starve. Docile and amiable, the fellah is resigned to his lot, and carries the heavy yoke uncomplainingly. To keep from the government a few piastres (cents), he is willing to receive any number of lashes, and will turn the other cheek for more. He delights to kiss the hand that strikes him, and being a grown-up child he weeps when the stroke pains him—that is all. Whatever the natural instincts of these people may be, and however the climate may enervate, from necessity they are at least not idle. It is not the worthless rabble of the cities who furnish the wealth, but it is the cultivator of the soil who pays the millions to the foreigner and enriches the officials of Egypt. There is little evidence of a desire to improve his condition, notwithstanding the great effort made by Ismail to elevate him. Content to live in his miserable mud hut, he will not inhabit a better, since the fear of imposts and official exactions deter him. He never spends anything for progress, and opposes all that is new or contrary to custom. He retains the same old plough, often dragged by a camel and a donkey chained together ; to draw water from the Nile he uses the same bucket (shadif) used in the time of Joseph, and employs the same old creaking asekia, a string of earthen buckets around a wheel, wherewith to draw water out of a well to irrigate his lands when the Nile is low. It is turned by a blinded buffalo, that Egyptian beast of all work.
These are the people squatted upon the débris of the Labyrinth, one of the greatest wonders of the world, where the women shake buffalo-milk in goatskins for hours to make butter for use, and the men may be seen nursing the children and knitting stockings for sale. It is difficult to realize that this race exists where once stood that Labyrinth, of which even the Greek historians were forced to write : “ If one were to unite all the buildings and all the great works of the Greeks, they would yet be inferior to this edifice, both in labor and expense, although the temples of Ephesus and Samos are justly celebrated. Even the Pyramids are certainly monuments which surpass their expectation, and each one of them may be compared with the greatest productions of the Greeks ; nevertheless the Labyrinth is greater still.”
The crumbling Pyramids found here tell us that this was a great necropolis for the millions of dead. It was a celebrated spot from the earliest ages, and its history culminated in great magnificence during the splendid epoch of the twelfth dynasty. This valley, now so neglected but still so beautiful, must have presented at that time a parterre of varied beauty, unrivalled by anything in that marvellous country of agricultural and architectural wonders. Here the great Thothmes and Rameses, of the eighteenth and nineteenth dynasties, gave forth their edicts in the midst of the great political and religious assemblies, while gathered in united wisdom under the same eternal sun, which gladdened the scene then as it does now with nature's green carpet, its golden harvest, and the waving palms. Here war was declared, and the martial tread of thousands was heard, and kings and queens bent in humiliation under the iron heel of the Egyptian Pharaoh. Now there is a stillness like that of an eternal Sabbath, and scarcely a vestige is left to show that it was ever otherwise. If the Labyrinth surpassed all wonders out of Egypt, the artificial lake (Moeris) was greater. Instead of an expanse of over thirty miles of water as in that day, it is almost entirely a cultivated field now. Amenemhah, a Pharaoh of the twelfth dynasty, about 3000 years B.C. dug an artificial lake in the centre of this oasis, covering a surface of over 10,000,000 square yards, as a reservoir to hold water enough not only to irrigate the Fiyoom valley, but to extend down the left bank of the Nile over 200 miles to the sea. It was so arranged with dams and sluices as to completely control this immense volume of water, in connection with a natural lake already existing, and thus fertilize the whole land for that great distance.
Before leaving this interesting subject I must speak of a passing incident. Last winter in one of the cities of Florida I saw a man standing in front of a wagon selling what he called “ wizard oil,” promising to cure all the diseases poor humanity was heir to, and adding that it made old people young again. An old decrepit lady, hearing this note of comfort while passing, raised her venerable head to be assured, and then darted across the street for a bottle. This incident reminded me that a sheik I met in the Fiyoom oasis said that the legend with the Arabs was that Joseph lived here. The patriarch riding out one day met an old and ugly woman, and was forced to say that she was more hideous than any one he had ever seen. She replied by asking him to pray to Allah to make her young again, and as Allah always answered his prayers it would come to pass. Joseph did so, and she became so beautiful that he married her. She survived him to a green old age, and was gathered to her fathers. She soon found herself the only old woman in Paradise, and learned that Allah never made old women young but once.
If we pity the fellah standing in rags and wretchedness up to his middle in mud, it is amusing to witness the sort of comic superiority he assumes over the civilized man, for he believes himself a favorite of Allah, and thinks he is assured of a future in Paradise. How much more amazing is the story told by the hieroglyphics, that his ancestors, the ancient Egyptians, who were the wisest people of their day, who conquered the world and constructed monuments of utility and grandeur many of which exceed in extent and magnificence anything even in this day, made use of this wonderful lake to nourish and protect the loathsome crocodile, and that they worshipped it with the deepest devotion. They named a populous and renowned city and province after it, and in order that the reptile might be perfectly happy, had prepared for it geese, fish, and various meats, dressed with tender care to tempt its appetite. Its head and ears were ornamented with rings, its feet with anklets, and it had a necklace of gold and artificial stones. Rendered tame by kindness, after death it was embalmed in the most sumptuous manner, and its sacred remains deposited in a gorgeous tomb. It is difficult to decide at which to marvel the more, the ancient man who built all these magnificent monuments but worshipped the crocodile, or the modern one who destroyed all these fine constructions but who believes in Allah. There is a satisfaction in knowing that there was a difference of opinion as to the superior merits of this repulsive creature, for in the next Heracleopolitan province the wise people worshipped the ichneumon, the deadly enemy of the crocodile, the fable being that it crawled down the throat of its neighboring god when asleep and fed upon its sacred intestines. The result of this amiable rivalry caused bloody feuds between the two provinces, and resulted in a terrible conflict in the early Roman day, so violent that it is said to have been the cause of the destruction of the Labyrinth. Pliny writes that the destruction was as much due to these superstitions as to the corroding tooth of time. It is to be hoped that in further research among the hidden tombs more light may be thrown upon a religion which descended so low in the scale of creation to find an object of worship. The same people not only built splendid monuments, but threw a halo of beauty around the highest maxims of truth, giving expression to some of the finest moral conceptions of which the human mind is capable.
Some of the richest lands in Egypt were at one time the private property of the Khedive (Ismail), and a large portion, nearly a half million acres, was planted in this oasis. Beginning near here, there were 200,000 acres situated along the left bank of the Nile, extending some distance above Minieh, and 50,000 more above Luxor. Among the numerous constructions of Ismail, one that reflects wonderful credit upon him consists of the great embankments and other appliances for the collection, distribution, and regulation of the vast volume of water so necessary to successful cultivation in this country. There were many grand constructions of this character, which will compare favorably with those of the ancients in their most brilliant era. Loud clamor has been made against the Khedive for wastefulness, but in these improvements he has shown lasting and practical usefulness. It cannot be said that he wasted money in his lavish attempts to advance cultivation by the introduction of new inventions for agricultural purposes, by planting trees and establishing beautiful gardens, breaking as he did through the trammels of long usage to effect these changes for the certain prosperity of the people, in spite of the opposition of all classes. No man in the world had such planting interests. The railroads to traverse his estates cost over $5,000,000 ; there were twelve enormous sugar-mills, among the largest in the world, each said to have cost $1,000,000, with great numbers of refineries and cotton-gins. These were called extravagances, but they added to the wealth and increased the population of Egypt. Ismail was anxious for the development of the country, and particularly its soil, knowing that the life of his people and his own security in this age of progress required these improvements. It must be remarked here that Ismail, in his too great desire for these civilizing influences, was deceived by the foreigner into purchasing millions of dollars' worth of machinery, including steam-ploughs, that proved utterly useless for cultivation in Egypt. As late as the year 1879, when I left Egypt, there was much of it scattered along the banks of the river, fast becoming unfit for use anywhere. It can be said of these transactions that they are evidences of the over-confidence of Ismail in the Western man, who often practised deception to gratify his own cupidity.
Unfortunately these enormous plantations were under the ban of custom, which all the power of the Khedive could not effectually change, and they did not yield so abundantly as the soil and climate promised ; though at his fall he had gradually led his people to the use of new implements, and agriculture on these estates was assuming the air of European prosperity. Accustomed to wheat, barley, lentils, and other ancient Egyptian productions, Egyptian crops were comparatively abundant, and the old plough of the time of Joseph answered tolerably well. In crops of more recent introduction, like maize, rice, cotton, sugar-cane, and indigo, an entire change became necessary. In looking at their rich soil the fellahs were afraid to lose some of it, unless they sowed everything broadcast as they did wheat. They could not be persuaded to give the plant more room to grow, and to follow the American system, where the yield is so abundant. They would only depart from the time-honored practice to a degree in the cultivation of cane and cotton. Some of their crops, like the cane, have not covered expenses ; and it is said that the bondholders who now have the estates of the Khedive find it difficult to fight old traditions and the unwieldy mass of the customs and habits among the fellaheen, and that they too are taking a step backward. By continuing the wise system of irrigation commenced by Ismail, and the employment of experienced American planters to change the present system to that which will cause the soil to yield its full capacity ; by a judicious expenditure for suitable implements for the culture of cotton, corn, and sugar-cane, with such a perfect climate, free from frost, returns should be obtained greater than those of any other country. The great Ibrahim Canal, which Ismail hoped to finish, with its immense dikes and basins, was incomplete at his fall. It does not furnish the necessary volume of alluvial soil, and in consequence does great injury to much of the lands by its injudicious use. After the water of the Nile has settled it produces an infiltration, there being a destructive saline property in the soil, which is thus made to come to the surface. It has also been the custom to use as manure the débris of the ancient ruins, which is filled with nitre. This mistaken policy has done considerable injury to the lands. Some of my acquaintances, as there was no rotation in crops as in other countries, used phosphates and imported fertilizers. They have in this way furnished their rich soil with an element that seemed wanting ; and this has been particularly beneficial in the cultivation of cane and cotton, so exhaustive to all lands.