1851.] Floods in India of 1849. 191 



through all their borders, deluging the country as they went. On the 

 3rd of August the cantonments of Wuzeerabad on the Chenab were 

 entirely flooded, and the troops required to be moved. This however 

 was a trifling matter in comparison to what followed a fortnight after- 

 wards. A tremendous fall occurred in the mountains of Cashmere, 

 from which the Jhelum draws its waters. The inundation which 

 followed deluged the plains below the salt-range. At Pind Dadun 

 Khan, the Government salt stores were washed away — at Shahpore, 

 a little further down, the cantonments were swept away, and the troops 

 compelled to withdraw to a distance of five miles. The flood gathered 

 force as it advanced by a heavy fall of rain, about four inches having 

 been measured in the course of the night, betwixt the 15th and 16th at 

 the usually dry station of Mooltan. About 80 miles above this the river 

 burst through all its embaukmeuts, and laid the whole country under 

 water, the bastions, outworks and other works of Mooltan, which a year 

 before had for four months defied all the efforts of our Artillery, melted 

 into the flood. On the 16th, three magnificent domes fell, and at 7 

 on the morning of the 17th, the enormous cupola of the BahawulHuk 

 came thundering to the ground, with a noise like the explosion of a 

 stupendous mine. The whole structures were built of unburnt bricks. 

 No such flood had been known to occur. The effects of the deluge 

 were felt at Sukkur, and all down the course of the Indus. 



The burst of rain during the first two weeks of September occa- 

 sioned a second series of floods further to the South. The town of 

 Cambay was completely inundated by the flooding of the Mahi on the 

 19th, in conjunction with a tide of almost unprecedented height : 

 seventy houses fell, hundreds of others sustained most serious damage. 

 To the South of Surat, no river of any size finds its way to the Western 

 Ocean, though the vast streams which discharge themselves in the 

 Bay of Bengal have their sources in the Ghauts close by, and are of 

 course affected by the Western Rains. On the 10th the Godavery 

 rose in the Nizam's dominions to an unusual height : the river Moosa 

 which takes its rise to the westward of Hydrabad, swollen by the rains 

 which had prevailed for a fortnight all over the country, burst through 

 all its banks. On the 12th it burst into the city, washing down the 

 walls, levelling the houses, and destroying the neighbouring canton- 

 ments. A rise of a few feet more would have choked up the bridges, 



