ficient in accuracy. These two
passages make it evident that Nekos had commenced some great
improvements on the canal of Sesostris; and it appears to have been his
intention to have made use of it in order to secure a naval superiority
in the Red Sea. It is plain, too, from the statement of Herodotus, that
Darius had completed the canal, in so far as that was possible, without
the invention of locks, for forming an immediate communication with the
Red Sea. And from the account of Diodorus, it seems that he viewed the
canal of Darius, which for ages had served for a commercial route, as
incomplete; because the actual junction of the waters of the canal and
the Red Sea had not taken place until Ptolemy Philadelphus, by applying
the invention of locks, had enabled vessels to quit the canal in order
to navigate the sea.

Strabo, who was also well acquainted with Egypt, from personal
residence, mentions the locks constructed by Ptolemy. After saying that
even Darius had left the junction of the canal with the Red Sea
incomplete, from the danger of inundating the country, he adds--"During
the government of the Ptolemies, the isthmus was cut through, and a
closed passage (a _euripus_) formed, so that a ship, whenever it was
required, could enter the outer sea or pass into the canal."[1]

[1] Strabo, xvii. c. 1. Vol. iii. p. 444.--Ed. Tauch.

Though the canal constructed by Darius had been in general use for
commercial purposes, and was regarded by Herodotus, when he visited
Egypt, as a work in every way complete, still there can be no doubt that
its importance would be greatly increased by the locks connecting it
with the Red Sea. The augmentation in the trade, and the improvement in
the class of vessels which navigated the canal, induced Ptolemy to make
the changes in the whole course, from which it received the name of the
river of Ptolemy. A very great addition was thus made to the prosperity
of Egypt, as the canal would remain navigable for four months annually,
from the end of August to the end of December. During this season of the
year, the people of the Delta had little to attend to but the
exportation of their surplus produce, and clearing their granaries for a
new harvest, by selling all that portion of their grain which was
neither required for seed nor for the maintenance of their families.

It has been supposed very generally, but on no adequate authority, that
Ptolemy Philadelphus constructed this canal, with