Report on the Route from Seersa to Bahawulpore, by Major F. 

 Mackeson, C. B., B. N. I. Officiating Superintendent Bhutty 

 Territory. Communicated by the Government of India. 



From Major F. Mackeson, C. B. Officiating Superintendent Bhutty 

 Territory, to R. N C. Hamilton, Esq. late Agent to the Gover- 

 nor General, on special Mission to Seersa and Bahawulpore. 



Sir, — I have the honor to submit a map of the route surveyed by 



me from Seersa to Bahawulpore, with an abstract 



Abstvctct. 



Submits survey of statement of the different stages. From an impres- 

 road through the de- 

 sert, with list of sion that your mission would be accompanied by a 



Surveyor, I took no measures to provide myself 

 with instruments for taking observations for latitude and longitude, 

 the survey has therefore been laid down from bearings with a survey- 

 ing compass, on distances measured by a perambulator, but no care has 

 been spared on my part to make it as correct as the instruments at my 

 command would admit of. 



2. In submitting this survey I beg to offer a few remarks; first, on 

 the general features of the country traversed ; secondly, on the nature 

 and capabilities of the road that has been opened, and on the effect 

 its opening is calculated to have on different channels of commerce. 



3. The tract of country traversed from Seersa to Bahawulpore, 

 General feature of the measures in extent, from east by north to west by 



country— its Inhabitants south, two hundred and twenty-seven miles. The 

 first forty-three miles are through British territo- 

 ry, the next eighty-seven miles are through the N. E. portion of 

 the Hindoo state of Bikaneer, and the last ninety- seven miles are 

 through the Mussulman principality of Bahawulpore. This tract is not, 

 as has been thought, a desert of deep sand : the heavy sand bears no 

 proportion to the hard soil. From Seersa to Bhatner, though void of 

 large trees, the country near the road is covered with underwood of 

 jhand, karil and ban : beyond Bhatner, the stunted underwood is 

 partial, while bare shifting sand hills on a substrata of hard soil are the 

 common feature. The population is scanty. In the British territory 

 the inhabitants met with, are Bhattis, (Mussulmans,) and Bagri Jats, 



