1^6 OLDHAM: SANDHILLS OF CLIFTON NEAR KARACHI. 



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formation of embankment, the carrying a road across these mud flats, 

 enabled cargo to be landed at Keamari, close to where the ships lay, 

 and, at a later period, when jetties were built, to be landed without the 

 intervention of boats or lighters. 



Though increasing the convenience of the port, this continuous 

 embankment cut off all the backwater to east of it, and so affected not 

 only the force, but also the direction, of the currents of the tidal scour. 

 The first effect of this was an immediate silting up of the deep-water 

 anchorage off Keamari, but this effect was only temporary. After a 

 while the currents adjusted themselves to the new state of affairs, 

 and from 1854 to 1858 the channels became better defined, and the 

 harbour improved, till it resumed a condition almost as good as before 

 the building of the Napier mole. 



Meanwhile another effect of this embankment was to increase the 

 tidal scour through the eastern outlet of the harbour — that lying between 

 the Keamari island and Clifton. All the water from the eastern back- 

 water, which formerly flowed through the main entrance to the harbour, 

 was now forced twice a day backwards and forwards through the sub- 

 sidiary entrance. This entrance, consequently, scoured out, and a com- 

 parison of surveys made in 1856 and 1866 shows that the western side 

 of this outlet was cut back 1,500 feet in the ten years, while the tidal 

 scour from this creek kept the foreshore under Clifton comparatively 

 free from sand. 



Returning to the harbour proper, the further works carried out 

 were a stone groyne running out from Keamari island, which was 

 commenced in 1861 and completed in 1865, and a stone breakwater 

 running out from the end of Manora Point, which was commenced in 

 1870 and completed in 1873. These works were intended to improve 

 the navigability of the channel of access to the harbour and need not 

 be considered here, as they do not directly affect the foreshore so far 

 east as Clifton. In 1869, however, an opening was made in the Napier 

 mole, which, with the subsequent developments of this new policy, had 

 important results outside the harbour. In 1869, as has been said, an 

 opening 175 feet wide was cut through the Napier mole, re-opening 

 communication between the main harbour and the eastern breakwater ; 

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