All these facts of history tend to prove that ancient Egypt was a land peopled by an intellectual and refined race whose works live after them.
The great mass of the people in Lower Egypt are known as the ploughers, and are the descendants of the old Egyptians and of the Arabs who invaded the land. There are still Egyptians of unmixed ancestry to be found in the land. They are called Copts, and profess Christianity. The Arabs of pure ancestry, descendants of the conquerors of the Egyptians, are represented by the Bedouins, most of whom lead a wandering life, though a few have exchanged their nomadic life for a settled one in houses.
Among the many pleasing pictures of the nations of the interior, Dr. Barth, an explorer, furnishes one of a fine large town in Negroland proper. The houses were built partly of clay, with neatly thatched roofs of reeds; while the courtyard was fenced in with the same material. There was a cool outer building, formed of reeds and latticework, which seemed to be a reception hall for visiting and for the transaction of business; the whole surrounded by spreading trees. To add to the picture, groups of children, goats, fowls, pigeons, and—if the wealth of the family admitted—a horse or pack ox usually surrounded each hut. The people were cheerful and kindly and seemed to enjoy all that a wise Creator had provided for their sustenance.
At another town Dr. Barth found rude fortifications of clay. At this town, like the one before it, there was a dyehouse, for indigo was largely cultivated. The intervening country was exceedingly beautiful, with a great variety of vegetation. Here were many kinds of birds, known and unknown, and great herds of milk-white cattle were scattered over the rich pasture lands.
The population was small, but the people were active and industrious. Some women, bearing on their heads from six to ten calabashes filled with various things, joined the caravan, and not long after, a troop of men loaded with indigo plants passed by on their way to the dyehouse.
Extensive tobacco fields lay before them, and beehives, formed out of thick, hollow logs, were fastened to the giant branches of the colossal trees of the country. Passing through cultivated fields and populous villages where indigo was grown and prepared, his caravan reached a large, flourishing town, a little world in itself, different in external form from all that is seen in European towns, yet similar in many ways.
Here was a row of shops filled with articles of native and foreign produce, with buyers and sellers in every variety of figure, complexion, and dress. There were all the necessaries of life; the wealthy buying the more palatable things for their tables, the poor stopping to look greedily upon a handful of grain.
Here was a yard neatly fenced with reeds, and a clean, snug-looking cottage, the clay walls nicely polished, a shutter of reeds placed against the low, well-rounded door, a cool shade for the daily household work, a fine spreading tree, with its deep shadow during the hottest hours of the day, or a beautiful specimen unfolding its large featherlike leaves, or the tall date tree waving over the whole. The matron wore a clean, black, cotton gown wound round her waist; her hair was neatly dressed, and she was busy preparing the meal for her absent husband, or spinning cotton, and at the same time urging the female slaves to pound the corn. The children were naked and merry, playing about in the yard, or chasing a stubborn goat. Earthenware pots and wooden bowls, all cleanly washed, stood in order.
No one seemed idle; there was employment for all. Here was an open terrace with its many dye pots, and the people engaged in the various processes of their art. Farther on could be seen a sturdy blacksmith wielding his clumsy tools and producing, as a result of his labors, a dagger, the sharpness of which was, indeed, a surprise, when one saw the crudeness of his tools. Off in another direction men and women made use of a sheltered space along the fences to hang their cotton thread for weaving. Here was a caravan arriving with the prized kola nut, which had become as necessary to these people as tea or coffee is to the inhabitants of more civilized lands; and there a caravan starting off with salt for the neighboring towns. Arabs were seen leading their camels with heavy loads of the luxuries of the north and east, and troops of gaudy, warlike horsemen came galloping towards the palace of the governor. Everywhere was life in all its various phases.