picked up all the loaded trucks by this time, and were rumbling along at the rate of about ten miles an hour, followed by a racing, scrambling crowd of boys and girls, who rush out of the adjoining villages when the train passes, to pick up the scatterings of sugar-cane which fall from the trucks. For at least a couple of miles we were thus pursued, old men and women occasionally joining in the race, and in their eagerness to clutch the cane, rolling over each other on the track. By this time we have reached our lowest level: to the left, about five miles distant, beyond a flat, and in places marshy, tract, the blue waters of the lake glisten in the afternoon sun; and rising abruptly from their western margin are the Libyan hills, beyond which stretches an unexplored and desolate tract of the Sahara. In strong contrast with the wildness and beauty of the scene, a row of tall iron funnels or chimneys right in front of us indicate our destination, and we pull up between more piles of sugar-cane, in an atmosphere strongly flavoured with the allpervading odour of molasses. On a bluff about a mile to the right is the village of Aboukser, while the flat tract that intervenes between us

and the lake is an expanse of cane-fields, through which radiate branches of the agricultural railway in all directions.

Unfortunately I was not well enough to encounter the fatigue of a ride to the lake and back, and the boating and fishing expedition on its waters which had been the main object of my trip. Indeed I had hoped to be able to visit the ruins of Kasr Karoon, which are situated at its south-western extremity, as well as those of Kasr Nimroud just opposite, on the summit of the desert cliff, and the ruined walls of which could be distinguished from Aboukser with a spy-glass. There are no villages worthy the name on the margin of the lake. The fishing population are mostly Bedouin Arabs, who live in tents or hovels, and whose open undecked boats are of a primitive unwieldy description, without masts or sails, redolent of decayed fish, and affording, as I was informed, a maximum of discomfort in every way. I afterwards met an old resident in Egypt, and a distinguished Egyptologist, who had camped for eight days at the ruins of Kasr Nimroud, and who described them as consisting of gigantic mud-brick walls, evi

dently those of an ancient fortress, situated on a high plateau of natural rock, an hour distant from the margin of the lake, the road leading to which was paved with immense flags of stones, on which were visible ruts as of chariot-wheels. But, curiously enough, neither he nor any person at Aboukser of whom I made inquiry, had ever heard of Dimeh, with its street 400 yards long embellished with lions, and its ruined temple. Lepsius says it was marked on his map as Medinet Nimroud, but he could only hear of it by the name of Dimeh—an experience that illustrates how easy it is for travellers in these parts to be misled in regard to nomenclature it is supposed to be the site of the ancient Bacchis.

The ruins of Kasr Karoon are much better known than those of Dimeh or Kasr Nimroud; but even they would certainly repay further investigation. Five miles beyond Aboukser, on the same side of the lake, is the village of Senhur, which is situated on mounds indicating the site of an ancient city of some extent. Indeed there is every reason to suppose that in former times the edge of this plateau overlooking the lake was crowned with a series of towns

inhabited by a large population. In point of position and surroundings, all the modern villages have a sort of family resemblance, and of these Aboukser may be taken as a type. At the base of the bluff was an extensive grove of fine palm-trees, beneath which sugar-cane had been planted; and as I passed through it, the whole population were out cutting it. Men, women, children, camels, and buffaloes were picturesquely grouped under the shade of the tall feathering trees in the cane-field, all noisily at work; while through it curved a canal abundantly supplied with water, that found its way to the lower level by an artificial cascade about forty feet high, which foamed over a high dike that in former times retained its waters in a lake. After sketching so unusual an object in Egypt as a waterfall, I made my way to the top of it with the view of examining the ancient structure. The lake was now dry, and its bottom served as the vegetable garden for the village; but there was no question as to the extreme antiquity of the solid masonry, which might easily be repaired if it was considered worth while to reconstruct the reservoir. Above it to the right rose the high

H

mound upon which the modern village, looking almost like a fortress, is built; in rear of it are cactus-gardens, and the usual waste of brickbats and pottery, while here and there the mud-brick walls of an old house crop out, among which I found a few fragments of blue and green glaze, interesting enough to carry away. From the highest mound of débris a magnificent view is obtained over the lake, with a rocky island in the middle, and the plain stretching away north-east and southwest far as the eye can reach. The Birket el Kurûn is steadily stealing away the good land from the country, either submerging it altogether, or impregnating it so abundantly with salt as to destroy its value for all purposes of cultivation. This arises from the fact that owing to an absence of a proper surveillance of irrigation in the Fayoum, about three times more water is allowed to run into the lake than the evaporation can carry off, as, owing to its depression below the level of the sea, it has no outlet. This water might be advantageously employed in irrigating land now unproductive for the lack of it. Instead of its superabundance being thus utilised, it is allowed to