1
Passage 4
the Nile
Without the Nile, Egypt is nothing. Apart from the scattered oases in the Western Desert and the coastal areas along the Mediterranean and the Red seas, the Nile Valley is the only habitable and populated area of the country. For centuries, the river has provided Egypt’s entire water supply, its chief means of internal communication, its only source of power, and basic factor in its complex and vital pattern of agricultural development. Until the nineteenth century, this pattern remained virtually unchanged since the days of the Pharaohs. The flood waters of the Nile, which reach Egypt in summer after the rainy season far to the south in the highlands of Ethiopia, were diverted by irrigation canals to as much land lying on either side of the river as possible. When the water subsided, the peasants gathered their single crop for the year, and lived on it until the yearly miracle was repeated. Occasionally, Nature failed them and they went hungry; sometimes the flood was excessive and washed away their villages and drowned their animals. Either way, the Egyptians accepted with resignation an apparently unchangeable and largely beneficial natural cycle. The great dam at Asswan, completed as the twentieth century began, culminated attempts to control the Nile Egyptians now have some freedom from the river’s dictation. It is possible for two or even three plantings to be grown on the same land – incidentally increasing land values considerably
The main idea of this passage is:
A . Egypt has not changed since the Pharaohs.
B. The Nile River sustains Egypt.
C. Egypt often floods in summer.
D. The Asswan Dam controls the Nile.