Burnes, Alexander: Travels into Bokhara: containing the narrative of a voyage on the Indus from the sea to Lahore, ... and an account of a journey from India to Cabool, Tartary and Persia ; performed by order of the supreme government of India, in the years 1831, 32, and 33 (Band 1) (London, 1835)

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memoir of the indus.

CHAP. VI.

CHAP. VI.

the indus from tatta to hydrabad.

From the city of Tatta, which stands at a distance
of three miles from the river, we cease to have the
Indus separated into many channels. On the right
bank it is confined by low rocky hillocks of lime-
stone formation; and on the left there is but one
narrow branch, the Pinyaree, which is accessible to
boats from the town of Mughribee, when the super-
fluous water of the floods follows its course to the
sea. Yet the general width of the channel is less
than half a mile : near Hydrabad, it is but 830 yards;
at Tatta less than TOO; and below the village of
Hilaya, fifteen miles from that town, it does not, in-
deed, exceed 600. The greatest depth of water lies
opposite the capital, and is five fathoms ; the least
at Tatta, where it is but fifteen feet; generally,
there is a depth of twenty feet.

The Delta of the Indus is free from sand-banks;
from Tatta to Hydrabad, they occur every where ;
and, as the sides of the river are here more fre-
quently shelving than steep, it is difficult to discover
the deep channel, which perplexes the navigator.
Many of these sand-banks are but knee deep in the