From Kurrachee to Mooltan. 275 



<( dry" season absurdly long, tell of the rushes of water that 

 in the rains flood these plains. 



Kotree, or Little Cairo as it is sometimes called, presents 

 an agreeable contrast when you reach it full of the sand of 

 Sind internally and externally. The shady road from the rail- 

 way station, overtopped by bright green trees, arching over 

 head till they meet, the beautiful flower-gardens round the 

 houses, the placid river, the white-painted steamers and flats 

 moored to the bank, recall Cairo and the Nile to one's mind's 

 eye ; and also suggest what the other parts of Sind might be 

 with the aid of the water that makes Kotree so bright. A 

 shady road runs parallel to the river, leading to a fort-like 

 building and the steamers depot where we embark for Mooltan. 

 There is nothing in the width or appearance of the Indus here to 

 indicate its real size and grandeur, as the father of the five rivers 

 of the Punjaub. "Paunch" signifies five, and " aube" waters, 

 in Hindustanee, and refer to the five rivers, the Jhelum, the 

 Sutlej, the Chenaub, the Pavee, and the Beas, joining each 

 other, and eventually the Indus, after running through the 

 north-west provinces of India.* On the arrival of the morning 

 train from Kurrachee (which has been all night on the road), 

 and generally a few days after the mail from England via 

 Bombay, a steamer starts for Mooltan. Each steamer takes a 

 flat lashed on each side .of its paddle-boxes (for cargo), and 

 with these encumbrances, and little more than four feet of 

 water to depend upon at times, the reader may imagine the 

 navigation is peculiar and not without its difficulties. A train 

 of barges or flats joined to the steamer and each other, 

 so as to form a serpentine tail, of which the steamer was 

 the head, was a plan tried, but the windings of the river 

 are so abrupt, the stream so rapid and shallow, that this 

 did not succeed, and it is found now the more the steamer 

 and her barges are assimilated together to move rapidly and 

 in unison, the more successful they are in combating the ob- 

 stacles the river opposes. To the energy and enterprise of the 

 Oriental and Inland Steam Company are due the experiment 

 alluded to, and the merchants of Sind and the Punjaub are 

 indebted (although the experiment failed) to the- same com- 

 pany for having placed the new and fast steamers on the river, 

 where there were only the old vessels of the moribund Indian 

 navy, since replaced with some additions by the Indus Flotilla 

 Company. 



* Thornton says in his Gazetteer of India, "With respect to the propriety of 

 the designation, it is, however, to be observed that there are in fact six rivers, — 

 the Indus, the Jhelnm, the Chenaub, the Eavee, the Beas, and the Sutlej ; but 

 as the Beas has a much shorter course than the others, it seems to have been 

 disregarded when the name of the country was bestowed." — Ed. 



