From the Indus to the Tigris

by H. W. Bellew

By seven o’clock next morning we had cast off from our moorings, and were drifting down mid-stream, fairly started for a good day’s run. But we had hardly proceeded half-an-hour when a smart bump announced our stoppage by a sandbank. A little delay presently revealed the unpleasant fact that the Outram with her flats was jammed in a shallow channel with only two and a half feet of water. Anchors were thrown out, first on one side, then on the other; the engine was backed astern, and then turned ahead. The Outram was hauled first this way and then that; she was worked now backwards and again driven forwards; and so on in alternation for upwards of seven hours. Finally, about three o’clock, our unwieldy tria juncta in uno was wriggled out of the strait into free water four feet deep.

But we were not yet clear of our difficulties. A few hundred yards farther on we were again stranded on a sandbank; and not being able to get off it at sunset, anchored for the night in mid-stream, having during the day increased our distance from Multán by four miles more than it was on the previous evening. We did not get fairly off this bank till noon of the following day. And so we went on, with like obstructions daily, entailing more or less delay, till we reached Bakrí at sunset of the 30th. Here next morning we transhipped to the river steamer De Grey, the cargo being transferred during the night, and making a good start, arrived at Cháchá, a little below the junction of the Chenáb with the Indus, on the morning of the second day of the new year. Here our only fellow-traveller, the Rev. T. V. French, of the Church Missionary Society, left us for Baháwalpúr.

The De Grey fared only a little better than the Outram. We experienced many delays from shoal water and narrow channels, and at sunset of the second day ran on to a sandbank. The shock of the concussion caused one of the flats to break away from its attachments and crush against the stern of the steamer. The whole night was employed in securing the flat and working the steamer off the bank. By eight o’clock next morning we got off into free water, and making a good day’s run, at sunset moored for the night at Rodhar, a little hamlet of reed huts close on the river bank, and about forty-eight miles above Sakkar.

During the day, we saw immense numbers of water-fowl of all sorts. Ducks in great variety, coolan, wild geese, herons, cranes, and paddy-birds were the most prominent in point of size and numbers. Porpoises hunted up and down the stream, alligators on the sandbanks lazily basked in the sunshine, and wild pigs cautiously issued from the thick coverts on either side for a wallow in the shallows and puddles bordering the river’s stream.

In one of these shallows, formed by an overflow of the river, we witnessed a curious sight—an interesting fact for the naturalist. A large fish floundering about in the shallow water had attracted the attention of a buzzard flying overhead. The bird made one or two stoops at the fish, when a jackal, looking on from the edge of the jangal, came forward to contest its possession. He boldly went some twenty paces into the water, and after a sharp struggle seized the fish and brought it to land. Here he laid it on the sand to take breath and look around, and the buzzard, seizing the opportunity, again made a stoop at the fish, but was driven off by the jackal, who made a jump into the air at him. This was repeated two or three times, after which the jackal, taking up his prize, with head aloft proudly trotted back to his covert. The fish appeared to be at least twenty inches long.

We left Rodhar early next morning, and proceeded without obstruction. We passed a number of small hamlets close on the river bank on either side. They were composed of reed cabins supported on slender poles eight or ten feet high. Each cabin was a neat pent-roofed box, about ten feet long by six wide, and as many high at the sides. They belonged to Sindhí Jats, who live by fishing, cutting wood for fuel, and by tending cattle.

The country here is wooded close to the water’s edge by a thick jangal of Euphrates poplar, tamarisk, and mimosa, and here and there are great belts of tall reeds, eighteen to twenty feet high. The approach to Sakkar is very fine and unique of its kind. It presents a charming contrast to the dead level of the scenery on either side the river above it as far as Multán. The island fortress of Bakkar in mid-stream, with the many-storied houses and lofty palm groves of Rorhí, on one side, and the high rocks and sunburnt town of Sakkar on the other, are the characteristic features of this peculiar spot. We steamed through the channel between Rorhí and Bakkar, and then, making for the opposite shore, moored under the town of Sakkar at about one o’clock. It thus took us nearly eleven whole days to perform the journey by river from Multán to Sakkar. In the hot season, when the river is in full flood, the same journey is usually accomplished in one third of the time.

Cattle for our baggage and camp equipage having been collected here by previous arrangement, we left our servants to follow with them, and at half-past three set out for Shikárpúr in a buggy kindly placed at our service by Captain Hampton, Superintendent of the Panjab Steam Flotilla. At Mangráni, the half-way stage, we mounted camels sent out for us, and in four hours from Sakkar, arrived at Shikárpúr. The road is excellent throughout, and laid most of the way with long reed grass to keep down the dust. The country is flat, crossed by many irrigation canals, and covered with jangal patches of tamarisk and mimosa. In the last five miles from Lakkí to Shikárpúr, cultivation is general, and large trees become more abundant.

In the morning our obliging host, Colonel Dunsterville, Collector of Shikárpúr, took us for a drive to see the place. In the public gardens called Shákí Bágh is a small menagerie and the Merewether pavilion. The latter, built after the design of those useless decorated structures one sees at English watering-places and pleasure gardens, is a striking object, absurdly at variance with all its surroundings. But it is characteristic of our prejudices and tastes in matters architectural. We unaccountably neglect the encouragement of the oriental architecture, with its elegant designs, elaborate detail, and durable material, for the nondescript compositions, incongruous mixture of colours, and inferior material of the public buildings and monuments we have spread all over the country. We seem to forget that what is suitable to the climate, conformable to the scenery, and acceptable to the tastes of the people of Europe, may be the reverse in each instance when introduced into this country without modification or adaptation to its circumstances. The town of Shikárpúr is clean for an oriental city, and wears an air of quiet and prosperity. The environs are well stocked with large trees, such as the ním (melia azadirachta), sirras (acaciaelata), sissú (Dalbergia sissoo), palm, &c., and the roads are everywhere covered with a layer of reeds to keep down the dust. The people are clad in bright-coloured garments, and appear a very thriving commercial community. The bazaar is covered with a pent-roof, and has a cool look, which alone must be a boon in this hot climate. There is a very useful charitable dispensary here, and a jail for five hundred prisoners. I observed that the convicts were clad in fur jackets (postín), a luxury very few of them ever possessed in their free state.

We left Shikárpúr at two o’clock, and drove to Sultán di Gót, where we found camels awaiting our arrival. The one intended for my riding took fright at the buggy, tore away from his nose-ring, and, luckily for me, escaped into the jangal. This I say advisedly; for had the frisky creature been recaptured, I could not have declined to ride him, and the consequences might have been anything but agreeable. I was unaccustomed to this mode of travelling, and knew little about the handling of a camel. Had he bolted with me on his back, there is no knowing where he would have stopped, and the jolting—well! it is lucky I escaped the chance of its consequences.