AN IRRIGATED FIELD.
Formerly the Nile had several mouths, and from many seaports Egypt carried on its trade with the outside world. Today only Rosetta and Damietta remain to give their names to the two branches by which alone the Nile now seeks the sea. These interesting seaports, mediæval and richly picturesque, are no longer the prosperous cities they once were, for railways have diverted traffic from the Nile, and nearly all the seaborne trade of Egypt is now carried from Alexandria or Port Said, the northern entrance to the Suez Canal, and it is by either of these two ports that modern visitors make their entry into Egypt.
Alexandria is interesting as the city founded by Alexander the Great, but with the exception of Pompey's pillar and its ancient catacombs has little attraction for visitors. The town is almost entirely Italian in character, and is peopled by so many different races that it hardly seems Egypt at all; boys, however, would enjoy a visit to the Ras-el-Tīn Fort, which figured so largely in the bombardment of Alexandria, and away to the east, near Rosetta, is Aboukīr Bay, the scene of a more stirring fight, for it was here that, in A.D. 1798, Nelson destroyed the French fleet,[1] and secured for Britain the command of the Mediterranean.
[1] In the "Battle of the Nile."
After the monotony of a sea voyage, landing at Port Said is amusing. The steamer anchors in mid-stream, and is quickly surrounded by gaily painted shore boats, whose swarthy occupants—half native, half Levantine—clamber on board, and clamour and wrangle for the possession of your baggage. They are noisy fellows, but once your boatman is selected, landing at the little stages which lie in the harbour is quickly effected, and you and your belongings are safely deposited at the station, and your journey to Cairo begun.
Port Said is a rambling town, whose half brick, half timber buildings have a general air of dilapidation and unfinish which is depressing. The somewhat picturesque principal bazaar street is soon exhausted, and excepting for the imposing offices of the Suez Canal Company, and the fine statue to De Lesseps, recently erected on the breakwater, Port Said has little else to excite the curiosity of the visitors; built upon a mud-bank formed of Suez Canal dredgings, its existence is its most interesting feature, and the white breakers of the Mediterranean, above which it is so little raised, seem ever ready to engulf it as they toss and tumble upon its narrow beach.
Leaving Port Said behind, the train travels slowly along the canal bank, and we begin to enter Egypt.
On the right the quiet waters of Lake Menzala, fringed with tall reeds and eucalyptus trees, stretches to the far horizon, where quaintly shaped fishing-boats disappear with their cargoes towards distant Damietta. Thousands of wild birds, duck of all kinds, ibis and pelican, fish in the shallows, or with the sea-gulls wheel in dense masses in the air, for this is a reservation as a breeding-green for wild-fowl, where they are seldom, if ever, disturbed.
On the left is the Suez Canal, the world's highway to the Far East, and ships of all nations pass within a stone's throw of your train. Between, and in strange contrast with the blueness of the canal, runs a little watercourse, reed fringed, and turbid in its rapid flow. This is the "sweet-water" canal, and gives its name to one of our engagements with Arabi's army, and which, from the far-distant Nile, brings fresh water to supply Port Said and the many stations on its route.