Statement showing the commerce of Smyrna for the year ending December 31, 1876. 750 1,242 344, 487 1, 126 1,997 $6,000 44, 712 826, 388 4,504 480, 514 58,794 400 25, 960 14,736 2, 205, 560 Russia. England and France. England, France, Germany, Egypt, and Italy. Austria-Hungary, France, and Italy. Germany, Austria-Hungary, England, Belgium, England, France, and Italy. Germany, United States, England, Austria-Hun- Do. United States, England, and Holland. Austria-Hungary and France. Austria-Hungary, United States, England, and England, England, France, Greece, and Turkey. England, Austria-Hungary, France, Egypt, England, Egypt, Greece, and Russia. England, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, Egypt, 1,022, 166 1, 124, 108 Sundry goods........packages. 68, 462 Germany, United States, France, Austria-Hun- England, Austria-Hungary, Germany, France, 1,391, 394 England, Austria-Hungary, Egypt, France, quintals 885, 605 3,711, 236 England, Austria-Hungary, France, Belgium, England, France, Austria-Hungary, and Italy. Wines .barrels. 3,639 50, 920 3, 213 198, 812 England, France, Russia, Egypt, and Italy. England, France, United States, Austria-Hun. gary, Italy, and Holland. England, France, United States, Austria-Hungary, Holland, Russia, and Italy. Statement showing the navigation at the port of Smyrna for the year ending December 31, 1876. ENTERED. TRADE WITH THE UNITED STATES. 781, 766 Statement showing the imports and exports between Smyrna and the United States for the eleven months ending August 31, 1877. EGYPT. CAIRO, November 1, 1877. (Received December 7.) Report upon the agriculture, commerce, and finances of Egypt for the year ending August 31, 1877. Since the transmission of my last report no official statistics have been published relating to the commerce, agriculture, or manufactures of Egypt, and reliable information upon any of these subjects can only be obtained with great difficulty and from private sources. I have made application to all the departments, and the answer received is that nothing has been prepared. Such statistics as have been obtained will be embodied in this report or inclosed with it. AGRICULTURE. Condition of the rural or fellaheen classes.-The rural districts of Egypt present a strange anomaly. The richest and most productive lands in the world are occupied and cultivated by a people in extreme poverty, living in mud or unburnt brick hovels, little, if any, better than those of the barbarians of Central Africa. The black slaves brought from the interior are as intelligent and, in everything that pertains to modern civilization, little if at all inferior to the native rural population of Egypt, and so far as relates to their treatment and physical comforts, they are quite as well off and equally contented. Of the two and sometimes three crops annually produced, only enough is left the fellah for his scantiest subsistence. With the price of all kinds of provisions higher than in the United States, his circumstances are such as not to permit him to consume on an average to exceed five cents' worth of food a day. Everything not required for his actual physical necessities is taken in one manner or another for taxes, and if the amount demanded is not forthcoming the whip is freely used until it is paid. This instrument is in fact indispensable to the collector of taxes. The tax agent demands the taxes of the sheiks of the small villages, and if the required sum is not paid, the sheik is whipped and sent away to procure the money; and chagrined, if not smarting from his own punishment, he does not fail to repeat the same process upon the fellahs under his jurisdiction. Sometimes when there is a deficiency in the payment of the amount required in a particular district, the tax agent summons all the sheiks to meet him at some designated place, and such as do not produce the sums demanded are whipped, and the process is afterward repeated from time to time until the money is paid. The manner of procedure above described and occasional imprisonment are the ordinary means of enforcing the payment of delinquent taxes. The sheiks sometimes suffer more than their share of the punishment. This arises from their relations to those under them. Their appointment is somewhat democratic, and their continuance in office to a certain extent a matter of sufferance. The older and chief men of the village designate one of their number to act as sheik, and if he were not sufficiently inspired with a sense of his duty to his constituents to resist the payment of taxes to the extent of subjecting himself to an occasional flogging, he would have very little excuse for punishing those under him, and a poor chance for continuance in his positi on, which is one of great power in his little community. The idea of the fellah is that if he pays freely the amount asked, for which, in fact, he rarely has sufficient money, more will be demanded under the belief that he is able to pay it, and that in any event he will finally be punished. There is probably some truth in this, for the rule that governs many of the subcollectors is to take all they can find, and the sum demanded by the government is often so large that with the good will and the most strenuous efforts of all parties it could only be procured with the greatest difficulty. The time of collecting taxes is very irregular, and they are often demanded long before due, and in sums greatly in excess of those authorized by law. In the latter respect there are great abuses on the part of the subordinate officers and sometimes the sheiks. The government often demands of the provincial governor a certain sum to be paid within a fixed number of days, and in order to obtain it, he is compelled to resort to measures that would be regarded as excessively severe in any Christian country. The products of Egypt.-Notwithstanding the little apparent inducement, the fellah labors faithfully, and the land produces, if not to its maximum capacity, as nearly as it would be likely to do if it were cultivated according to the modes of more enlightened countries. The products per acre are very large. This will be readily seen when we consider the fact that the land of Egypt (not including Nubia) capable of cultivation has an area only of about one-sixth of that of the State of New York, and that from this small territory about 5,000,000 of people receive their support and pay annual taxes to the amount of $50,000,000. Irrigation. While the land produces thus bountifully, the labor required in its cultivation is proportionally great. The tillable land of Egypt consists of the delta of the Nile and a narrow valley extending from Cairo southward. This valley is generally from one to ten miles wide, though for 150 miles above Cairo it has a width of from ten to thirty miles. Both the delta and the valley, except so far as the former borders on the Mediterranean, are bounded on all sides by mountainous deserts, and for more than 2,000 miles from its mouths the river has not the smallest tributary. It rolls on toward the sea, unlike other rivers, constantly decreasing in volume. As there are no rains of any practical importance, it sustains all vegetation, and all the inhabitants of Egypt and all its herds drink its waters. It is to this country the source of life, and should its flow be stopped, every plant, shrub, and tree would wither and die in less than three months, and the whole land become as uninhabitable as the Great Sahara. The millions of native inhabitants, who have never drunk any other water, await its accustomed annual rise with more solicitude than a northern farmer awaits the return of spring. The facts above stated are known to most well-informed persons, but comparatively few know or have anything more than the vaguest conception of the amount of labor required to conduct the waters of this great river and raise and distribute them, at precisely the right time and in the required quantities, upon every acre of cultivated land. For two or three months in the year a considerable portion of the country may be irrigated by the natural rise of the river, but, with the exception of certain sections, the water is not permitted to flow freely over the land. It is taken from the river and conducted by canals alongside the fields where it is to be used and then let upon the different parcels of land, if it is sufficiently high, and if not, it is raised by some of the various modes employed for that purpose. Small embankments prevent the water from running on to other lands that may not at the time be in a condition to receive it. In fact the processes of over |