FIG. 128.—_Bird’s-eye View of Port Saïd._ ]
Beginning with the Mediterranean Sea and Port Saïd, there is a run of 28 miles to Kantara, through Lake Menzaleh. Although called a lake, it is, in truth, nothing but a shallow lagoon or swamp, in which water-fowl of all kinds are very abundant, the great flocks of white pelicans and pink flamingoes being especially striking. The waters of this lagoon cover lands that once were fertile, and the salt sea-sands doubtless conceal the remains of many an ancient town.
FIG. 129.—_One of the Breakwaters at Port Saïd._ ]
Of all portions of the undertaking, this one, M. Lesseps states, was the most arduous and difficult, though, at the time, it attracted the least attention. A trough had to be dredged out of the bed of the shallow lagoon, and on either side of this hollowed out space high sandbanks had to be erected, and the difficulty of making a solid foundation for these sand banks was found to be extreme. The difficulty, however, was surmounted, and such is the excellence of the work, that the water neither leaks out, nor does any of the brackish water of the lagoon infiltrate and undermine the great embankments.
At Kantara, the canal crosses the track of the highway between Cairo and Syria—a floating bridge carries the caravans across; and near this spot is stationed an Egyptian man-of-war, which supplies the police for the proper watch and ward of the canal. From Kantara to El Fendane is a distance of 15 miles—that is to say, to the southern extremity of Lake Ballah, where the canal still passes through sand embankments, raised within a mere. The lake is, however, almost dried up, and therefore the difficulties which had to be surmounted at Lake Menzaleh were not felt here.
The traveller may now be supposed to have arrived at Lake Timsah, where, no doubt, in the days of the Pharaohs, a lake existed. When taken in hand by M. Lesseps, it was a barren, sandy hollow, containing a few shallow pools, through which a man could easily wade, but now it is filled with the waters of the Mediterranean Sea. It is a pretty, inland, salt water lake, about three miles in width. On the northern shore stands the town, or, rather, small settlement of Ismaïlia, which is, in fact, the “half way house” where most of the officials of the Suez Canal Company resided, as they could get to either end of the canal with greater facility, or to Cairo by the railroad, which comes to this point, and continues, with the canal, to Suez.