were thirteen gangs with their foremen on
the barges and three gangs with foremen on the steamer. We found the
Nile river water of good taste but muddy and we generally left it
standing for an hour to settle. A funny sight was presented by a cow and
a small camel harnessed to a plough. A stick crooked suitably by nature
was laid over both necks and tied round each and a native rope was run
from the yoke to a stick, also crooked to suit the purpose by nature,
used as plough, scratching about two inches deep and three inches wide,
at a speed as I judged of one acre per week. Another unusual thing was
to see the crops in several stages of growth at the same time in
adjoining patches, from sowing to quarter grown, half grown and ripe
crops. This is one of the consequences of the Nubians depending upon the
overflow of the Nile to fertilize their soil. Directly the river begins
to fall they commence to sow their seed in the mud, it leaves behind,
and as the water recedes they follow it up with the sowing. The crop
farthest from the river of course gets the start.

[Illustration: A DAHABEAH.]

[Illustration: RAISING WATER ON THE NILE.]

The next novel sight was the irrigation of the fields. To lift the water
from the river, a frame is made by putting some cornstalks into the
ground and putting clay round them to make posts, which are placed about
six feet apart; the posts support a small stick, across which is laid a
crooked pole, with about a dozen bends in it, that balances a mud basket
on one end against a leather bucket on the other. The bucket holds about
as much as our common well bucket, a man is continually filling from the
river and emptying into a mud spout between the posts. The water is
led off in a small mud conduit over the farm which is divided into
sections, when one section is filled with water the stream is turned
into another one. These waterworks are kept going day and night. Once in
a while one may see cattle power used for irrigation of the following
old fashioned kind, the yoke is hitched to a primitive cog-wheel of
about twelve feet in diameter, which works into a smaller wheel placed
underneath it, the cattle walking over a bridge. The cogs are simply
pins driven into the outside of each wheel. The shaft of the smaller
wheel runs out over a ditch cut from the river and carries a large reel
about eighteen feet in diameter over which two native ropes are laid to
which are attached about forty earthen