30 The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babyloniavalley of the Nile, the Egyptian leads an open-air life. Except
for the purpose of sleep, his house is of little use to him, and in
the summer months even his sleep is usually taken on the roof.
He thus lives constantly in the light and warmth of a southern
sun, in a land where the air is so dry and clear that the outlines
of the most distant objects are sharp and distinct, and there is no
melting of shadow into light, such as characterises our northern
climes. Everything is clear; nothing is left to the imagination;
and the sense of sight is that which is most frequently brought
into play. It is what the Egyptian sees rather than what he hears or
handles that impresses itself upon his memory, and it is through
his eyes that he recognises and remembers.
At the same time this open-air life is by no means one of
leisure. The peculiar conditions of the valley of the Nile demand
incessant labour on the part of its population. Fruitful as the soil
is when once it is watered, without water it remains a barren
desert or an unwholesome marsh. And the only source of water
is the river Nile. The Nile has to be kept within its banks, to be
diverted into canals, or distributed over the fields by irrigating
machines, before a single blade of wheat can grow or a single
[031] crop be gathered in. Day after day must the Egyptian labour,
repairing the dykes and canals, ploughing the ground, planting
the seed, and incessantly watering it; the Nile is ready to take
advantage of any relaxation of vigilance and toil, to submerge or
sweep away the cultivated land, or to deny to it the water that
it needs. Of all people the Egyptian is the most industrious; the
conditions under which he has to till the soil oblige him to be so,
and to spend his existence in constant agricultural work.
But, as I have already pointed out, this work is monotonously
regular. There are no unexpected breaks in it; no moments when
a sudden demand is made for exceptional labour. The farmer's
year is all mapped out for him beforehand: what his forefathers
have done for unnumbered centuries before him, he too has to
do almost to a day. It is steady toil, day after day, from dawn to