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FISHING IN INDIAN WATERS. 
Part V.—KARACHI, 
By F, O, Gapspen, R. 1. M. 
(Read before the Bombay Natural History Society on 16th January, 1900). 
I have repeatedly heard it stated that few places exercise a more depressing 
influence upon the new-comer than does Karachi; but as yet I have never 
been able to find out the real reason for this. Partly, I think, it must be 
that the new arrival expects too much inthe way of scenery; he has heen 
picturing to himself the gorgeous beauty of the sub-tropical foliage, and here 
he arrives upon India’s strand at a place where there is little or no vegetation, 
and where everything looks dry, dusty, and parched, hence his disappoint- 
ment ; but, at the same time, few places that I know of grow upon one so 
rapidly, and so strongly, as does this self-same arid desert-looking town, and 
were I condemned to live out here altogether in the plains or on the coast, 
I think I should choose Karachi, Karachi itself has no harbour proper ; one 
part, or rather suburb, of the town extends down towards the seashore, but 
the seaport for Karachi consists of two small hamlets, called respectively, 
Manora and Keamari., 
The harbour is nothing more than a narrow arm of the sea, which in the 
course of time (aided by the effects of a small stream which runs in at the 
head) has been cut out of the soft sandy ooze by tidal effect, and which of 
late years has been enlarged and the efforts of nature materially assisted by 
constant dredging and by judicious banking in of the sea tidal water, so as to 
confine it to the deeper parts, 
Manora is but a small collection of houses on the left as you enter, and 
consists only of the forts, lines for the garrison and officers’ houses, a few 
small houses for the pilots, and, lastly, the Indian Government Telegraph 
workshops and quarters for the employés, with church and school, These 
all stand upon a narrow spit of sandy deposit which runs out to sea, and 
which gradually rises seaward, until where the lighthouse stands, it assumes 
a fairly respectable appearance, about 150 ft. high, and this eminence, 
which is of soft sandstone, which has here cropped up is curiously like a 
miniature Gibraltar,and is crowned by the lighthouse. Going on past 
Manora, and still on your left, you come to a series of tidal creeks where 
the sand and mud are present in about equal quantities, and where there is 
a rough growth of mangrove, and where the ground, from being so low and 
so often under water, is little else than a permanent swamp; but there 
isa beautiful sandy ridge on its sea face which slopes down to the shore in 
a perfectly lovely beach, 
This swamp and the creeks which run through it are the resort of quanti- 
ties of curlew, large and small, of the flamingo, and numbers of plover, 
godwits and waterfowl generally are to be found here, more especially in the 
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