ABSTRACT
The Barrage or Barrages. From time immemorial the Nile has been allowed to water the land of Egypt according to its own will and pleasure, and there are no records to show that any ruler of Egypt seriously undertook to regulate the supply of water to the cultivable lands by means of dams or reservoirs. The river has been allowed to waste itself for thousands of years, and it was not until the present century that any attempt was made to keep the Nile and its branches within bounds. It is recorded by Clot Bey (Willcocks, op. cit., p. 257 ; R. H. Brown, History oj the Barrage, p. I; Milner, England in Egypt, p. 239) that Napoleon 1. saw the necessity of some means of regulating the supply of water to the Rosetta and Damietta branches of the Nile, with the view of letting the whole of it flow first down one branch and then down the other, thus doubling the effect of the inundation in flood. In 1833 Mnl)ammad 'Ali blocked the head of the Rosetta branch with a stone dam, which made the Nile stream flow into the Damietta branch, wherefrom all the large canals in the Delta drew their supply. Linant Pasha, seeing the serions
effect which would be produced upon Alexandria and the Ellstern Delta if this action were continued, remonstrated with his master, and proposed as an alternative the construction of a Barrage across the head of each branch, about six miles below the bifurcation of the river. This proposal was approved by Mubammad 'Ali, and when informed by Linant Pasha of the amount of stone, etc., which would be required, promptly ordered it to be taken from the Pyramids, and only relinquished this plan when it was proved to him that stone could be got at a cheaper rate from the quarries at Cairo. The work was begun in 1833, and was continued until 1835, but towards the end of this year it was carried on with less vigour, and soon after it was entirely stopped. For seven years the old system of clearing uut the canals by the corvee was revived, and nothing more was done. In 1842 Mougel, a French engineer, proposed a system of Barrages, to which was united a series of fortifications which were to be built at the bifurcation of the river, and the idea pleased Mubammad 'Ali, who ordered the work to be undertaken at once. The Damietta Barrage was begun in 1843, and the Rosetta Barrage in 1847. The work was hurried on so fast that it was badly done, and the disrepute into which Mougel's magnificent scheme fell in later years was due to his master's impatience and interference with his plans. In 1853, the new Viceroy, 'Abbas Pasha, dismissed Mougel, being dissatisfied with the rate of progress made, and Mazhar Bey was ordered to finish the Barrages on Mougel's plans. Commissions sat on the matter, and although the defects of the work already done were well known, no attempt was made to remedy them, and the Barrages were finished in 1861. They had cost £1,800,000, exclusive of the corvee, and the fortifications, etc., cost £2,000,000 more. These works form the famous" Barrage," which lies about fourteen miles to the north of Cairo; the Rosetta
Barrage has 61 arches and two locks, and is about 1,512 feet long; the Damietta Barrage has 61 arches (originally 71) and two locks, and is about 1,730 feet long. In 1863 the gates of the Rosetta Barrage were closed, so that more water might be turned into the Damietta branch, and cracks promptly appeared in the structure. In 1867 ten openings or arches of the Rosetta Barrage separated themselves from the rest of the work, and moved out of their places. In 1876, Mr. (late Sir) John Fowler reported on the Barrage, and he proved that the floor and foundations were cracked, that the latter were too shallow, and that £1,200,000 would have to be spent to make the work fit for any useful purpose; General Rundall, R.E., also reported on the Barrage, and estimated that it could be made serviceable for £500,000, and described how the repairs were to be carried out *. Finally, in 1883, Rousseau Pasha, Director General of Public Works, rleclared that the Barrage could only be used as a distributor of the river discharge between the two branches, and that to make it fit for this purpose it would be necessary to spend about £400,000 upon it. With the failure of the Barrage to do its work, the supply of water in the canals naturally failed, and the Egyptian Government had to pay a Company £26,000 per annum to pump water into one canal only; and when Sir Colin Scott Moncrieff, in 1883, came to Egypt, ministers were solemnly thinking of adopting a scheme for pumping water into all the canals in the Delta. The engines were to cost £E. 700,000, and the annual cost was to be about £ 250,000 ; and "the Egyptian Government was actually on the verge of trying to lijt the whole river" (Milner, oj. cit., p. 242).
