Page:Travels to Discover the Source of the Nile - In the Years 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, and 1773 volume 3.djvu/720

 6 9 4 TRAVELS TO DISCOVER

the Wafaa Ullab or payment of the meery, in Hadrian's time, that it does at this day, and confequcntly the land of E- gypt has not increafed fince his time, that is, in the laft 1600 years.

As a fnmmary of the whole relating to this periodical inundation of the Nile, Ifhall here deliver my opinion, which I think, as it is founded upon ancient hiftory, confonant to that of intermediate times, and, invincibly eitablifhed by modern observation, can never be overturned by any argu- ment whatever. And this I fhall do as fhortiy as pomble, left, having anticipated it in part by reflections explanatory of the narrative, it may at firfl light have the appearance of repetition.

It is agreed on all hands, that Egypt, in early ages, had water enough to overflow the ground that compofed it. It was then a narrow valley as it is now ; having been early the feat of the arts, crowded with a multitude of people, en- riched by the moft flouriihing and profitable trade, and its numbers mpplied and recruited when needful by the im- menfe nations to the louthward of it, having grain and all the neceffaries and luxuries of life (oil excepted) for the great multitude which it fed, Egypt was averfe to any communication with Grangers till after the foundation of Alexandria.

The firft princes, after the building of Memphis, finding the land turn broader towards the Delta, whereas before it had been a narrow ftripe confined between mountains ; o >- ferving alfo that they had great command of water for fit- ting their land for cultivation, nay, that great part of it ran

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