3892.] H. G. Raverty —The Milirdn of Sind and its Tributaries. 491 
wliicli, Khwajah IDjizr’s island, on which is the Khwajah ka Than, 
history distinctly shows was part of the main land on the Rurhi side 
up to nearly two centuries and a half after the conquest of Sind by the 
Arabs. 
What I have here stated is corroborated by a singular coincidence, 
which will enable us to arrive at the approximate period when the 
Ab-i-Sind, Panj Ab, or Panch Nad had already cut a channel between 
Rurhi and Bakliar, thus separating them from each other. In the little 
island of Khwajah Khizr, 569 above-mentioned, there is a masjid whose 
569 Khizr or Elias, sometimes confused with the Prophet, Elias, and said to 
have been the Wazir of Kai-Kubad, the ruler of T-ran Zamm, is stated to have 
discovered and to have drank of the fountain of the water of life, and consequent!y, 
will not die until the sound of the last trump at the judgment day. Khwajah 
Khizr, for this reason, is also called the Zindah or Living Pfr ; and it is oat of this 
that the compiler of the “ Gazetteer of Sind,” when referring to this island, makes 
out the shrine to be worshipped by the HindGs as a river god under the name of 
Jinda Pir. This is after the fashion of turning every masjid , or place of sijdah 
into a “ mazjidT Khwajah Khizr is also accounted, in consequence, the patron 
saint of the waters or rivers, hence Muhammadans of Hind are in the habit of 
offering him oblations of lamps and flowers, placed on little rafts, and launched 
upon rivers, particularly on Thursday evenings (the Friday evening of Musalmans 
as the night precedes the day) in the fifth solar month, August. It is at this time 
that the festival of the herd or raft is held, when a raft is launched upon the waters 
in honour of Khwajah Khizr. 
The legend respecting the island of Khwajah Khizr or Khwajah ka Than is, 
that a shepherd named Baji, whose hut was situated where one of the quarters of 
the town of Rurhi now stands, observed one night a bright flame burning at some 
distance from him ; and under the supposition that some travellers passing that 
way had kindled a fire, he despatched his wife thither to obtain a light. She went, 
but the light vanished as often as she attempted to approach it. She then returned 
and l'elated what she had seen to her husband, but Baji, thinking she was frightened, 
did not credit what she told him, and went himself to procure a light. He found, 
however, that what she had told him was true ; and he concluded that it must bo 
some miraculous manifestation. Filled with awe, he thereupon erected a takiyah , 
than, or devotee’s station there, turned devotee, and gave himself up to the care of 
the spot. Shortly after, the river is said to have changed its course, and to have 
encircled the ground on which the than of the lOiwajah stands. 
This island lies a little north of Bakhar, but the channel separating it from the 
fortress is narrow and not difficult to cross. 
With regard to the date, 341 H., which is undoubtedly correct respecting the 
shrine of Khwajah Khizr, it is certain that the branch of the Hakra was diverted 
from near Aror sometime before this date ; and, in all probability, the river had 
shifted from the westward of the present Sakhar more to the east, and had begun 
to cut its way between the present Rurhi and Bakhar, before the island of Khwajah 
Khizr was detached from the main land. From all accounts I believe this branch 
was diverted, and this great change took place about the year 335 II. (910-917 A D.) 
