Mexico weekly ledger., 1902-03-13
tGrpT-Br WAY OF BEGINNING


years ago. Its history is full OF inter
est alike to Bible student and 10 I'M
believer. Moslem saint and Christian
dog find fascination In the Nile, the
melancholy, sl1w-moving stream upon
which fair Cleopatra sailed in her
gilded barge, which Graded Moses and
to the banks OF which q VirgiE Mother
fed to ave her Infants life. Not
merely forty centuries, as Napoleon
declared dramatically 10 his soldiers
but half as many more look down
from Egyptian monuments upon the
dwellers in Its perpetual sunshine.
From the battlement OF the Citadel in
Cairo one may see the Past assembled
in panorama to greet his gaze. Yon-
der is the deSolate city Of Memphis,
earliest OF the Worlds capitals, to
the eastward is Goshen where Jacob
dwelt in his old age while his son, an
eutwhile slave, ruled Egypt its first
Khedive; three miles down the Nile
near Embabeh Napoleon, mightiest Of
modern warriors, defeated the hordeS
Of fierce Mamelukes; through yonder
dilapidated gate Saladin marched to
meet Richard and his Crusaders ON
the plains of Acre and down these
narrow, t~uunel-like streets Haroun-al-
Raschid, from Bagdad freshly come,
pursued his midnight rambles. As if
this were not enough the Pyramids
stand in the evening shadows and the
Sphynx looks down in frowning
majesty, a pulling problem unex-
planned. The Egyptian Museum at
the Niles brink holds the bodies Of
the great RameSes and his ancestors;
while a few PAGES away rests the re-
mains Of the Roumelian warrior,
Vehement Ali, man Of blood and iron.
EGYPT AND MISSOURI.
Egypt, like Palestine, is a small
country to have played such a large
and luminous part in the worlds
affairs. Upon the map it appears
quite large. In reality, however,
when only the cultiyable and inhabit-
able land is included it is absurdly
IGmall. / tcontains but eleven thous-
and square miles, or scarcely one-slxth
the territory OF the State of Missouri.
II stretches along the banks OF the
Nile southwark from the fan-shaped
Delta on the Mediterranean TO the
SOudan region across the equatorial
line. Yet these eleven thousand
square miles OF tillable land support
over nine million people and pay the
interest upon a mOnstrons foreign
debt. Stretched upon the mapof Mis-
souri, Egypt would include about the
Mississippi river bottom lands, averag-
Ing ten miles wide from Kansas City
TO the Mississippi and the shore Of
that river TO st. Louis for the Delta.
Upon this narrow thread OF territory
!, has been transacted events which
have shaped the destinieS OF the
|. human race for two hundred genera
lions and longer. And now 1t is more
densely populated than any country
in Europe. It's farm land averages in
value $40 an acre. 1t grows from
two to five crops a year while the
rudest farm implements, a sharpened
: stick for a pillow, a wellsweep OF two
t with buckets for irrigation machinery.
t suffice to produce a yield which almost
staggers belief. The anne population
to the square mile in Missouri would
| give that state ifty-four million PEG
pie and the same yield per aere would
increase its exports more than sixty
! fold.
e FROM VENICE no THE AFRIC COAST.
Venice is city 50 unique, so fairy
' like, that one leaves il no matter fol
E what other land it is as though a
] whilom dweller in Paradise would
check his trunk for earth. But If am
t land could tempt away from Italy il
must be Egypt and If any city can ap
proximate the charms Of Venice il
certainly is Cairo. Alexandria is th'
( port for Cairo, but it is more than
e port as we shall see. 1t is a long ant
' serious sea-voyage from Venice dowI
the widening Adriatic and straigh.
across the Mediterranean to the sand
shore Of Africa upon which modem
Alexandria is built. The steamship
b was the Bosforo, Of the Navigation
Generate Itallano, which Q tn
!. Italian line. We bad a solitary Eng
lishman for fellow-passenger. Al
Others on board we're foreigners 0
divers tongues. Even the babies o.
d these Mediterranean steamers CRY il
e an unknown language when they or,
o at all, which they seldom do. Ar
foreign babies better brought up thai
our own OF is It because they are sui
is dued and spiritless?
ALEXANDRIA, SEAT OF EoYPTIAl
le COMMERCE.
], 1t never rains In Egypt-that !
hardly ever. But Alexandria is no
IS Egypt In this respect. The weathe
J. saluted US with an old-fashioned gu
e ly-washer. Why is it there is usual
unusual weather upon ones first visi
10 a town.
le Alexandria is an ancient city an
Is looks modern. Cairo Is modern an
Ie looks ancient. Alexandra is CONNIE
e cial and Cairo Official. Alexandra
IS was twelve hundred years old whe
10 the first stone Of Cairo was laid but S
often has it been destroyed and s
h completely that the three hundre
ID and fifty thousand citizens now hay
1f a comparatively new town.
le Alexander the Great was wise b.
yond bis age when be selected the SIT
the Egyptian city which should bes
n his name. Ptolemy Softer made Alei
q andria a seat of~learning and establish
ed the world-famOns library whic
ri Romans burned 10 their eyerlaStin
u disgrace. Later a second splendi
he library was burned by the fanatic;
r Calf Omar who declared that as IN
b Koran contained all that men shoul
d know other books had 40 right |
N exist.
IS So for six months the fires Of Alel
7, andria's four thousand public bath
81 were fed with the priceless manuscrII
le and books. A final deathblow cam