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LESSON 32 The valley of the Nile
第三十二課 尼羅河流域
Egypt may be said to owe its very existence as a habitable country to the presence of the Nile. The course of that magnificent river has now been traced to great lakes lying across the Equator, more than two thousand miles south of Alexandria in a direct line. After receiving its two Abyssinian branches, at Khartoum and at Berber in Nubia, it pours the broad, deep volume of its waters through a flat, alluvial valley for fifteen hundred miles without being increased by any other tributary, and finally discharges itself by two principal channels and several minor outlets into the sea.
埃及之所以能成為一個(gè)適于居住的國家可以說完全歸功于尼羅河的存在。這條壯麗的河流的源頭如今可以追溯到橫跨赤道的五大湖，距離亞歷山大南部直線距離2000多英里。該河在與位于喀土穆和努比亞的阿比西尼亞的兩條支流匯合后再未匯入其它支流，其寬闊而又深邃的水流穿過了1500英里的平坦的沖積河谷，最終通過兩條主要渠道和幾個(gè)次要出口流進(jìn)了海洋。
The whole of the cultivable soil of Egypt, with the exception of the oases of the desert, consists of the meadow-land on either bank of this noble river; and it varies in width from five to one hundred and fifty English miles. It has been renowned for its fertility from the earliest ages, and was long rightly regarded as the granary of the ancient world. Even at the present day its fruitfulness is without a parallel in any region of like extent.
埃及所有的可耕地，除了沙漠中的綠洲，包括這條高貴的河流兩岸的草地，其寬度上的差異從五英里到一百五十英里不等。那里土壤的肥沃自遠(yuǎn)古時(shí)代就已聞名于世，長期被視為古世界的糧倉，即便在今天，那里土地的富饒程度也是無與倫比的。
This fruitfulness is consequent upon the periodic inundations of the river. Although there is little or no rain in Egypt, there are continuous and heavy rains at the sources of the Nile. These begin to fall in March, and being supplemented by the melting of the mountain snows in the following months, occasion a perceptible rise in the river about the end of June. From this period to the close of September, the rise increases with a regularity almost certain and constant, at a rate of four inches a day.
這種富饒得益于尼羅河的周期性泛濫。埃及雖然很少下雨或者說不下雨，然而在尼羅河的源頭卻有連續(xù)不斷的大雨。那里的雨季從三月開始，接下來的幾個(gè)月里山上積雪的融化使得水位再次增加，以致于六月底的時(shí)候水位漲幅顯著。之后從六月底到九月底這段時(shí)期，尼羅河水位將持續(xù)上漲且漲幅固定，即每天上漲四英寸。
