. Europe and other continents . Fig. Suez Canal at Port Said. nants of the ruling classes of ancient Egypt. They are stillChristians in spite of centuries of oppression by the Moham-medans. A third class is that of the Arabs, among whom arethe nomadic Bedouins (Fig. 307) who dwell in the desert. As a result of British direction there has recently beenmarked progress in Egypt. Extensive irrigation workshave been undertaken, and the land area for cotton andsugar thereby been greatly increased. By meansof reservoirs and canals it is further proposed to reclaim 438 AFRICA thousand
. Europe and other continents . Fig. Suez Canal at Port Said. nants of the ruling classes of ancient Egypt. They are stillChristians in spite of centuries of oppression by the Moham-medans. A third class is that of the Arabs, among whom arethe nomadic Bedouins (Fig. 307) who dwell in the desert. As a result of British direction there has recently beenmarked progress in Egypt. Extensive irrigation workshave been undertaken, and the land area for cotton andsugar thereby been greatly increased. By meansof reservoirs and canals it is further proposed to reclaim 438 AFRICA thousands of square miles of the desert. A number ofrailway lines has also been built (Fig. 313), including a part of the proposed. line from Cairo to CapeTown (p. 426). Out-side of the Nile Valley,however, travel stilldepends largely uponthe use of camels (). Suez Canal. —Northeastern Egyptincludes the Isthmusof Suez, which connectsAfrica with Asia. This narrow neck of land has for cen-turies stood as a barrier to water travel from Europe tosoutheastern Asia, compelling Euro-pean vessels to pass all the wayaround Africa in order to reachsouthern Asia. Little wonder is it,therefore, that a ship canal has beenbuilt there. Fig. view of a part of Cairo. The Suez Canal, begun in 1859, wascompleted in 1869. It extends fromSuez to Port Said (Fig. 297), and iseighty-seven miles long, with a depthof twenty-six feet and a width at thesurface varying from sixty-five to onehundred and twenty yards. Its lengthis much greater than that of the pro-posed Panama Canal, but the difficul-ties of construction were less. The country is very level, and,as in the case of the proposed Nicaraguan Canal, a part of the KALEV
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectgeograp, bookyear1901
