Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 1.djvu/93

 below the level of the Mediterranean. Although apparently quite flat, it has a sufficient incline for the waters of the canal derived from the Bahr-Yusef to circulate throughout the whole area, imparting to the Fuyum a fertility rivalling that of the Nile delta itself. The superfluous water is collected towards the south in the small Lake Gara'a, or the "Hollow," whence it formerly penetrated far into the Wady Reyan. Towards the west the system of canalisation converges in a large lake about 30 miles long from south-west to north-east. This reservoir,

known as the Birket-el-Kerun, is but slightly brackish, and quite drinkable by animals when it floods the whole western depression of the valley. But when reduced by evaporation it becomes saline, and the margin is then covered with crystalline efflorescences resembling snow at a distance. In some places the muddy ground, clothed like the Algerian sebkhas with a slight incrustation of salt, forms treacherous quagmires, dangerous to man and beast.

Till recently the superfluous waters were supposed to escape through a rocky gorge in the hills north of the Fayum Valley, to the depression known as the