Manawatu Herald. SATURDAY, DEC. 13, 1902. Egypt.

Manawatu Herald, 13 December 1902, Page 2

Manawatu Herald. SATURDAY, DEC. 13, 1902. Egypt.

Some clay the fellaheen of Egypt will rise up and bless the British occupation, as it has been of untold value to him, lessening his burdens, reducing his taxation and in fact, making a man of him. On the 12tii February, 1899, the Duke of Connaught was in Egypt and laid the foundation stone of the Assouan dam, and he will be in Egypt shortly, on his way to India, when he will open the completed work. The importance of this function is not readily realised without taking very many things, into consideration. It may be recalled that it was only as far back as the year 1879 that the commencement, leading to the joint occupation of Upper Egypt by the British and French occurred, which has now expanded into the occupation of the Soudan by the British, (nominally with the Egyptians). It was then found that the Khedive who had borrowed very large sums of British and French money, was hopelessly insolvent, the expenditure then exceeding the revenue by two million pounds. The British and French acted together to secure their people’s property,and forced the then Khedive, Ismail, to abdicate, and they then appointed his son, Mohammed Tew fik in his stead, whose son Abbas now reigns over the country. Having ..succeeded so far they appointed a joint control over the public purse, and matters might have proceeded satisfactorily together, had not France, at the outbreak of the rebellion, which led co the British bombardment of Alexandria, refused to do anything to help and thus lost, for ever, any further word in the general direction. The joint control was not actually killed, but Britain’s decisions are free from obstructions, and as far as the Soudan provinces are concerned it has been declared that they are outside of even the suspicion of any partnership, except Egyptian. From the town of Cairo to the Mediterranean the river Nile forms two channels, and owing to the deposit of silt and mud by the river the land is the richest soil known to the world for agricultural purposes. Properly treated, this land brings forth three crops always, and frequently four, every year. This country has been known for ages as the granary

of the world, as shown by the Biblical accounts of Joseph and his brethren ; and by the Romans haring used Egypt as their chief granary for centuries when Sicily became unequal to supplying her demands. The physical peculiarity of Egypt is the general absence of rain, and the land in only nourished by the Nile, the longest river in Africa, having its rise in the Victoria and Albert Nyanza lakes. The flooding of the Nile is an anxiously awaited event, sometimes we hear of a high Nile, at other times of a low Nile, when much suffering,takes place. The high and low do not refer to the ordinary river but to the stats of the floods. During the flood, the times of which are very regular, the various canals connected with it are filled taking the waters to the cultivated lands, but the supply is beyond the power of the cultivated land to absorb, and nine-tenths of it is wasted in the Mediterranean. The first rising of the flood is noticed in the middle of July, by the “ red-water ” the colour of the stream ; it attains .its maximum (an average rise of 36 feet at Thebes, and 25 feet at Cairo) at the end of September, and begins to fall visibly at the end of October, and reaches its minimum in April. The Earl of Oromsr, the British Representative, saw at once that the wealth of the country and the improvement of the condition of the fellaheen would be vastly improved if this waste of the flood waters of the Nile could be prevented and turned to profitable account. The idea of forming two or more dams across the Nile so, as to form immense reservoirs had been from time to time considered, but the difficulty always arose as to where to fmd the money to pay for them, as the French were still parties to the International Control though they did nothing but to refuse supplies. However, one day Mr John Aird, M.P., the great contractor (backed by a strong financial syndicate) waited on the Government and offered to build (and ask for no money till the work was done) two reservoirs, so that they need not ask the Caisse de la Dette for anything. Matters were arranged and within a few days the Duke of Connaught, will open one dam.

The Ni!e Reservoir at Assouan will contain over 1,000 million tons of water. During the three or four reservoir will be equivalent to a river double the size of the Thames in mean annual flood condition. The dam has cost about two millions of pounds, and the dam at Assuit one thousand one hundred and eighty thousand pounds. The advantage gained by Mr Aird not calling up money until the work was finished was that immediately water was secured the increased revenue would be sufficient to pay interest on the cost as well as much again for revenue for the Egyptian Government. Thus a remarkable achievement has been accomplished, as not only has an important blessing been secured for the tillers of the land, but it has practically been obtained without cost.