357 APPENDIX. CHAP. I. Page 14. Thermometrical Ranges for Twelve Months at Sukkur, in Upper Sindh, during the Year 1841. At Hyderabad, in Lower Sindh, the mean maximum for the six hottest months is thus: April, 97°; May, 101°; June, 103°; July, 97°; August, 98°; September, 95°. A comparison being made, the range will not be found much higher at Sukkur during that particular period. In both places, however, a mean maximum of nearly 99° for the six hot months is considered unusually high. The mean maximum on the Nile, at Grand Cairo, is 8710. CHAP. II. Page 38. The distance from Shikurpúr to Candahar, as given by the latest authorities, is nearly 350 English miles. CHAP. IV. Page 69. In the towns of Shikarpúr and Karrachi, the population has a majority of Hindús; that of Karrachi, according to a late report by Captain S. Hart, of the Bombay army, is nearly 14,000, of whom 9000 are Hindús. CHAP. IV. Page 73. As a late order by the Governor-General of India, consequent on the conquest of Sindh, abolishes slavery throughout the whole territory, the following additional information on the condition of slaves, kindly furnished by the author's friend and brother officer, Captain S. Hart, in his detailed reports on the town of Karrachi, may be considered interesting : — "Muscat is the port from which slaves are all brought to Karrachi, and hence sent up the country for sale: they are divided into two classes, the Seedhees, or Africans, and the Habshees, or Abyssinians. Sometimes a Georgian is brought down, but only on a private order; their price being too high to admit of speculation being made on them. The Seedhees are mostly all children when imported, grown up persons being considered more likely to run away. Their price at Muscat varies from fifteen to thirty dollars, according to their strength and appearance. The slave merchants tell me that boats are sent from the port down the coast of Africa with cargoes of coarse cloth and dates; that they visit certain places where the children are collected in expectation of their arrival. One of the crew is sent on shore, and he places on the beach the quantity of goods he considers equivalent to the value of a slave. If thought sufficient, a child is brought to him and the package taken away, and so on until they have obtained the number they require. Girls are brought in greater numbers than boys, and both are sold here at from sixty to one hundred rupees each the latter are said to be extremely intelligent at learning any trade, and the fishermen, who own a good many, state that they make active and bold sailors. From six to seven hundred is the number annually imported, of which about three fourths are girls. The Habshee females are generally purchased at a more mature age, as mistresses for men of rank. The features of those I have seen were good, but their complexions rather dark, or inclining to a copper colour. Perhaps thirty or forty may be landed in each year; but, as their price is high, (from 170 to 250 rupees, according to their good looks,) and their health rather delicate, few like to lay out money on them. The price of the Habshee lads is upwards of a hundred rupees; but they are seldom for sale, as they are not brought down unless on a commission from some great man, who wishes to bring them up in his family only three or four arrived during the past year. It is the interest of a master to treat his slave kindly where so many opportunities exist for desertion, and I have not heard of many instances of tyranny in this neighbourhood. They appear in general contented with their lot, are most of them married, and certainly cannot complain of being overworked. A few have, indeed, sought shelter in our camp, but they were the property of poor people residing at Beila, or in that vicinity, and chiefly complained of a want of food as having led to their first quarrelling with their masters, and then running away when punished. From the intercourse between Sindhians and Seedhee women, one race, called Guda, has sprung up they are equally slaves with their mothers, and may be bought or sold at will. The tribe of Beerovees, who dwell near Beila, make a practice of selling their children when in want, which appears to be generally the case, as no difficulty is experienced in obtaining them whenever required. Hindús prefer them as household servants, in consequence of their being better looking than Seedhees, and able to speak the Sindhian language." CHAP. VII. Page 121. For the following valuable report and remarks on the navigation of the Indus, the author is indebted to the kindness of Rear-Admiral Sir Charles Malcolm, late Superintendent of the Indian navy, under whose immediate orders the beautiful surveys of the river by Lieutenant (now Captain) Carless, of the I. N., were carried out, and whose interest and exertions in all connected with the navigation of the Indus have been un remitting and highly conducive to the great object proposed. This latter officer's practical knowledge and experience of the peculiarities of the Indus render every opinion he may offer of the highest value; and the author believes he is warranted in asserting that, notwithstanding the difference of opinion which prevails on the subject of Indus navigation, the best informed naval officers, amongst others Captain Carless, consider that, with properly constructed boats to be used as tugs (such as are now erecting by the Honourable Company), trade could be safely and advantageously carried on from Bombay up the Indus and Sutlij rivers, instead of, as heretofore, from Calcutta by way of the Ganges, and down those streams; and though, at present, the harbour of Karrachi (before described as that of all Sindh) is said to be closed against steamers during the monsoon, yet no efforts having hitherto, on any one occasion, been made to watch the effects of the monsoon on the Karrachi bar, no decided and definite opinion can be given as to its impracticability or otherwise. It, moreover, appears, much to be desired that the Bombay government should appoint some able officer from the Indian navy to be present, and to make such daily and detailed reports during two monsoons as will settle the question; for in every point of view, commercially and politically, it is of the highest interest to know whether we are to have our steamers shut out from Karrachi, and consequently all communication by sea cut off for three months in the year. The above opinions are advanced as those of parties who may be considered preeminently qualified to give them, and it is sincerely to be hoped that Bombay, knowing her own interests, will eventually find matters in Sindh in that position to enable her to disprove the opinion elsewhere prevailing, that the western presidency cannot derive the advantages contemplated from the upward navigation of the Indus, but that Calcutta must continue to supply the countries on and beyond that stream, because the Indus and Sutlij are not navigable! OFFICIAL REPORT ON THE STATE AND NAVIGATION OF THE INDUS BELOW HYDERABAD, COMPILED BY LIEUT. CARLESS, I. N.; WITH A REPORT ON THE INUNDATION OF THE INDUS, ETC. ETC., BY LIEUT. WOOD, I. N. branches. About fifty miles from the sea, the river Indus, it is well known, State of the divides into two grand arms, the Buggaur and the Setta. During the dry season, no communication now exists between the Buggaur and the main stream, a sand bank having accumulated at the confluence, which is five or six feet above the level of the water; in all the branches diverging from it the water is salt for the greater part of the year, and they are then merely inlets of the sea. The Setta, or eastern arm, pursues the same course to the ocean as the great river from which it is supplied, and is, in fact, a continuation of it; in every part it preserves a similar magnitude, and for a long period it has been, as it is now, the principal channel of the Indus: in its passage to the sea it receives many local appellations, but is best known near the coast as the Munnejah or Wanyani. Of the four branches it sends off, the Mull and Moutni are impassable at the point where they leave the parent stream, and nothing is now seen of these once noble rivers but two shallow rivulets, one of which you may step across, and the other but a few yards wide. The Hujamri and Kedywari are the only two now favoured to any extent by the fresh water, or which possess navigable channels into the main river; the latter, however, can scarcely be called a branch, for it is merely a shallow creek with a broad entrance that quits the Munnejah near its mouth. Above the Delta two more branches are thrown off by the Indus, the Pinyari and Falláli, which are rivers only during the inundation; after it has subsided they dry up for miles, and are besides closed by bunds thrown across them above the seaport towns. The Indus formerly reached the sea through eleven large Mouths. mouths; but three of them now suffice in the dry season to discharge its waters of these the Phittee, Pyntianee, Jouah, and Richel belong to the Buggaur, and the Hujamri, Kedywari, |