…The Nile receives its last great tributary, the Blue Nile, near Khartum, in about the 17th degree of north latitude. Above the town the river flows quietly through grassy plains; below, the stream changes its peaceful character, as it makes its way through the great table-land of the north of Africa, and in an immense bend of over 950 miles forces a passage through the Nubian sandstone. In some places where the harder stone emerges through the sandstone, the river, even after thousands of years, has not succeeded in completely breaking through the barrier, and the water finds its way in rapids between the hard rocks.

There are ten of these so-called cataracts, and they play an important and sometimes an unhappy part in the development of Egypt and the Sudan. It is owing to them that intercourse by boats is rendered almost impossible between the Upper and Lower Nile except during high Nile, and even then there is risk of accidents happening to larger boats passing through these rapids. The last of these cataracts is 7 miles long, and forms the natural boundary of Egypt proper; close to it is situated the town of Assuan, the old Syene.

Below Assuan the character of the country again changes, and the valley, which in Nubia never exceeded 5 to 9 miles in width, broadens out, its greatest extent being, in one place, as much as 33 miles from side to side. The reason of this change is that at Gebel Silsileh, some way below Assuan, the sandstone (found throughout Nubia) gives way to lime stone, which forms cliffs bounding the river for nearly 475 miles. When the Nile reaches the Delta the limestone again gives place to later geological formations.

Thus Egypt in its entire length is framed in rocky walls, which sometimes reach a height of 600 to 800 feet; they form the stereotyped horizon of all landscape views in this country. These limestone hills are not mountains in our sense of the word. Instead of rising to peaks, they form the edge of a large table-land with higher plateaus here and there. This table-land is entirely without water, and is covered with the sand of the desert, which is continually trying to trickle down into the Nile, by channels grooved in the steep monotonous wall. On the west this barren plateau joins the shifting sand-dunes of the Sahara, which have never been thoroughly explored. About 95 miles from the river, and running parallel with it, are some remarkable dips in this table-land. These "oases" are well watered and very fruitful, but with these exceptions there is no vegetation in this desolate waste, which from old times has been called the Libyan desert. To the east of the Nile is a similar limestone plateau called the Arabian desert. Further inland it changes into a high mountainous country with bold peaks of granite, porphyry, gneiss, and other crystalline rocks rising sometimes to the height of 6000 feet. This magnificent range of mountains stretches along the Red Sea, and though very barren owing to the lack of rain, yet the country presents a more cheerful aspect than the Libyan desert. Springs of water are rare, but a dampness arises from the proximity of the sea, so that hardy desert plants grow everywhere, and in many places small oases are found which provide food for the wild animals and for the cattle of the nomadic tribes. The heat, however, and the want of water, make it most difficult to live in these mountains on the east of the Nile, and we cannot help admiring the courage and perseverance of the ancient Egyptians, who maintained hundreds of labourers working the large stone-pits and quarries in this vast rocky waste.

To return to the Nile valley:--had the river merely forced its way through the Nubian sandstone and the Egyptian limestone, the valley could never have attained its wonderful fertility under the rainless glowing sky of Egypt, where decomposition of all vegetation is so rapid. But the Nile is not solely the outflow of the great lakes of tropical Africa; it also receives from the west all the waterflow from the high mountains of Abyssinia; and the mountain torrents, laden with rocky débris, dash down the sides of the hills in the rainy season, and form the two great streams of the Blue Nile and the Atbara which flow into the Nile near Khartum and Berber. Thus in the middle of the summer the river gradually rises so high that the banks can no longer contain the vast quantity of water and mud. The river overflows slowly, and after some months slowly retreats again into its bed. While the water of the inundation covers the valley the mud in the water is of course deposited, and when the stream has retreated, the country is left covered with a thin coating of this mud composed of the finest stone dust from the Abyssinian mountains; it is this black Nile mud which has caused, and which renews each year, the fertility of Egypt. It now forms the soil of Egypt; and from Khartum to the sea the deposit of mud in the valley has reached the height of 30 feet, and in this mud the Nile has hollowed its present bed.

In another respect also the Nile is the life-blood of Egypt; it provides water for the country, for, as in the neighbouring deserts, there is no rainfall. On the coast of the Delta and for some miles southwards rain falls in the same way as in the other coast lands of the Mediterranean; but, with the exception of rare storms, this is never the case in Upper Egypt. There are also no springs nor brooks, so that for water the country depends entirely on the great river from the far south.

The climate of Egypt is more uniform than that of other Mediterranean countries, owing to the absence of the rainy season, which corresponds to our winter. From December to March the air is cool, and at night sometimes the temperature may almost go down to freezing point, but during eight months of the year it is very hot, and in July the thermometer rises to 110° Fahr. in the shade. Several causes combine to produce this difference of temperature. The hot south-east wind blows only from the middle of February to the middle of June, but this wind often rises to a hurricane, filling the air and covering the plants with dust; during the rest of the year even in the hottest season the northwest wind mitigates the intense heat of the day; the ancient Egyptians thought it one of the best things in life to "breathe its sweet breath." The inundation has still more effect on the climate than the wind. The stream begins to rise in the beginning of June; it becomes a mighty torrent by the end of July; from the end of September to the end of October the water reaches its highest level, after which time it retreats more and more rapidly. In January the stream is back once more in its old bed, but it goes on subsiding till the summer. This inundation, which we must not imagine to overflow the whole country, spreads' abroad coolness, dampness, and fertility; the country revives from the oppression of the summer heat, and we easily understand why the old Egyptians should fix their New Year's Day on the 15th of September, the time of highest Nile.

The days of inundation were, however, days of anxiety and care. The fate of the whole country hung in the balance, for if the water rose insufficiently but one-tenth part, the canals carrying the water to the higher level did not fill, and the result was the failure of the crops and famine. Again, if the inundation rose even slightly too high, sad devastation ensued; embankments and dykes were thrown down, and freshly cultivated fields, supposed to be beyond the reach of the water, were covered by the inundation. From the earliest times therefore, the rise of the Nile was closely watched and controlled by government officials, who regulated the yearly taxes by the result of the inundation. Nilometers were also constructed--these were wells in which the height of the water was marked as in a measure or water-gauge; they were under the special protection of the State. In old times as now, the height of the inundation was officially notified; and then also, as at the present day, suspicions were often aroused that the official statement was exaggerated. An old Nilometer still exists on the island of Elephantine, on the southern frontier of Egypt. In Greek times the height of a good inundation at Memphis was said to be 16 ells, and in the beautiful statue of the Nile in the Vatican the boy who represents the 16th ell looks down with great content from the cornucopia, up which he has clambered. This genius of the 16th ell is also to be seen on a coin of Alexandria, presenting his cornucopia to his father Nile. At the present day, on account of the ground level of Egypt having been raised by the mud deposit, a yet higher inundation is needed to ensure a good harvest to the country.

From the fertility of the Egyptian soil we might expect a specially rich flora, but notwithstanding the luxuriant vegetation, no country in the same latitude has so poor a variety of plants. There are very few trees. The sycamore or wild fig and the acacia are the only common forest trees, and these grow in an isolated fashion somewhat as the lime or chestnut tree grows with us. Besides these there are fruit trees, such as the date and dôm palms, the fig tree, and others. The scarcity of wood is quite a calamity for Egypt. It is the same with plants; herbs and vegetables reign in this land of cultivation, and wild flowers are scarcely to be found…