[70] Burnes describes the vast fields of soft sand, formed into ridges, between Bokhara and the Oxus. Their uniformity is remarkable, all having the shape of a horse-shoe, convex towards the north, from which the prevailing wind blows. On this side they slope, inside they are precipitous. The height is from fifteen to twenty feet. “The particles of sand, moving from one mound to another, wheeling in the eddy or interior of the semicircle, and having now and then, particularly under the rays of the sun, much the look of water, an appearance, I imagine, which has given rise to the opinion of moving sands in the desert.” (Bokhara, ii. pp. 1, 2.)
Our author may possibly have heard of the Reg-rawán, or “flowing sand,” of the Koh Daman, near Istalif. (See Wood’s Oxus, p. 181.)
[71] It may be gathered from what follows, that Lesser India embraces Sindh, and probably Mekrán, and India along the coast as far as some point immediately north of Malabar. Greater India extends from Malabar very indefinitely to the eastward, for he makes it include Champa (Cambodia). India Tertia is the east of Africa.
According to the old Portuguese geographer, whose “Summary of Kingdoms,” etc., is given by Ramusio, First India (see text, next page), ends at Mangalore, Second India at the Ganges.
Marco Polo reverses the titles given by our author. He makes Greater India extend from Maabar (south part of the Coromandel coast) to Kesmacoran (Kidj-mekrán or Mekrán), whilst Lesser India stretches from the Coromandel to Champa. Abyssinia, Marco calls Middle India. (See Murray’s Polo, pt. ii. ch. xxxvi.) Benjamin of Tudela speaks of “Middle India which is called Aden.” Conti says all India is divided into three parts, the first extending from Persia (Ormus?) to the Indus, the second from the Indus to the Ganges, the third all beyond.
It is worth noting that Pliny says it was disputed whether Gedrosia (Mekrán), etc., belonged to India or to Ariana. (vi. p. 23.)
[72] I believe this is substantially correct. Sindh is the only province in India that produces edible dates. A date-palm is found all over India, but the fruit is worthless.
[73] Till half-past nine o’clock. “Quod usque ad mediam tertiam per solis radios ullâtenus possit desiccari.” “The dews” in Lower Sindh, says Burnes, “are very heavy and dangerous.” (iii. p. 254.) The fertility of the country is, however, confined to the tracts inundated or irrigated from the Indus and its branches. As to the absence of rain, Dr. Lord says, that “the rainfall registered by Lt. Wood during one year at Hyderabad was only 2·55 inches, whilst at Larkhana, further north, a shower of rain which fell after the arrival of Burnes’s party was universally ascribed to the good fortune of the Firingis, as for three years, the natives said, rain had scarcely been known.” (Reports and Papers on Sindh, etc.—Calcutta, 1839, p. 61.)
[74] “Risis autem comeditur atque sagina in aquâ tantummodo cocta.”
[75] He is wrong about the non-existence of horses and camels in what he calls India the Less.