36 
PROCEEDINGS COTTESWOLD CLUB 
1915 
freely flow over it. This, I think, would make the bank per- 
fectly safe for some distance and, if a similar structure were 
placed farther down the stream, the interval would be protected 
too. Supposing the river to have passed the first pier and that 
it must pass the second, I do not see how iiny important 
deviation between the two could occur. Inundation there 
might be, but no undermining. I am not concerned with the 
prevention of flooding ; that is a different matter. Protection 
for a low- water channel must be at the edge of the channel. 
Any means for limiting the extent of tlie flooding must be at 
the line of the intended limit of flood. I do not see how any 
one structure can fulfil the double purpose. 
The fate of Dera Ghazi Khan is a striking comment on a 
statement attributed to Gibbon, that “ The servitude of 
rivers is the noblest and most important victory which man has 
obtained over the licentiousness of Nature.” Here is an 
instance of failure which, as I think, ought not to have occurred. 
The great bridge over the Ganges, recently built, is a magnificent 
success, but the Engineer, in his preliminary report, made 
this admission. ” The difficulty lies not in the actual building 
of the bridge but in the training of the river so that it will not 
desert the bridge when built. There is a very old book 
which contains an injunction to “ force not the course of the 
river. And, indeed, any attempt to force a great river to 
take a prescribed course, in flood time, may be expected to 
fail. But if the river be taken when in a gentler mood, the 
low-water stream may be led to the line intended for it. In 
this line it may be fixed : to this it will again restrict itself 
even though, in the “licentiousness” of flood, there have been 
an apparent desertion. The low- water channel will remain the 
deepest and the foundation, so to speak, although it have been 
for a time, entirely effaced. If I may offer advice, it will be 
to fix the low-water channels and guard against erosion by 
the stream at a level a little above that of low water ; this is 
the time when undermining is done. 
I am fully conscious that the great rivers of India are very 
different from those in England, but I have a firm faith in 
1 “Indian and Eastern Engineer,” July, lyn. Mr Arthur Sisson kindly. drew my attention to 
this and to other interesting work done on Indian rivers. 
2 Ecclcsiasticus IV., 2O. 
