Chapter II: Part 2

The horses are an abominable set of brutes, and generally begin by obstinately refusing to stir a step, or, perhaps, lying down in the shafts. Then the native coachman, after patiently undoing the rotten harness and getting the animal once more on his legs, addresses him by all manner of endearing epithets. “Go on, my brother,” (horse doesn’t move); “go on, my son, my brave, my hero,” (no result); a cut with the whip, followed by a vicious kick from the horse. Coachee changes his language—“Go on, you scoundrel—you villain;” a shower of blows, a volley of abuse from the passenger inside, more kicks and plunges from the horse, and finally, by the aid of the whole stable establishment, who push behind, whack the horse, and simultaneously yell like fiends, off you go at the rate of ten miles an hour, the horse never stopping until he gets to the end of his stage.

If there is no road, as happens very often, you must be content with the old-fashioned palanquin or doolie, a species of coffin with doors at the sides, in which you are carried on men’s shoulders at an average rate of three miles per hour, the bearers being changed every ten miles. When I first landed in India, I travelled from Calcutta to Allahabad, a distance of 500 miles, in this way, taking twelve days on the road; the journey being now accomplished by rail in about twenty hours.

After your night’s journey, in which you have probably accomplished some 35 miles, you are glad to espy a solitary house—a dâk-bungalow, as it is termed—in which you can get temporary rest and refreshment; so the doolie is deposited in the verandah; the hot and dusty traveller, who has hardly had a wink of sleep all night, emerges from the inside of the coffin, and summons the native servant, who in white robes and with a venerable grey beard, might sit for a portrait of any of the Old Testament patriarchs. Then ensues something like the following dialogue, which I must translate from the Hindustani, in which it is spoken:—“What can I have for breakfast?” say you.—“Your lordship can have everything.”—“Very well, then, bring me a beef-steak.”—“Beefy-e-steak! nourisher of the poor! how can your slave get any?”—“Well, then, a mutton chop.”—“Mutton-e-chāp! cherisher of the humble! there are none left.”—“Well, what is there?”—“Perhaps, O great king, there may be a fowl.”—“Then get it ready.” Exit the servant, and in another minute you hear a violent _clucking_ in the back-yard, and see the man in hot chase of a venerable cock, who evinces the strongest disinclination to have his few remaining days curtailed to satisfy your unholy hunger. But it is all of no use—he is captured; his head is turned towards Mecca, and the Mahomedan cook, muttering “Bismillah,” “in the name of God the compassionate and merciful,” cuts the fowl’s throat, and in twenty minutes more it is smoking on your table.

And now my watch warns me that I have tried your patience long enough. I have endeavoured to give you some idea of the nature of Anglo-Indian life, and of that country which has so often been described as the brightest jewel in the British Crown. But, after all, the only way to know much of a country is to see it; and I often wonder that more Englishmen do not pay a flying visit to India now that it is so accessible. Many certainly do go there now-a-days for a short time, and are, I am sure, well rewarded for their pains; but they are very, very few in proportion to those who might go, if they only knew how to set about it, and perhaps I cannot conclude my lecture better than by taking you all a journey there on paper, just as if I were Mr. Cook, and you were a party of tourists.

We start from the Waterloo Station and run down to Southampton, going on board one of the fine steamers of the P. & O., as it is always called, which I need not say is short for the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company. The mails are on board, the last good-byes have been said, and we are steaming down Channel and across the Bay of Biscay, until, on the fifth day, we cast anchor off the Rock of Gibraltar. A few hours’ delay for coaling, and we run on to Malta, and find ourselves in Valetta Harbour, wandering about the quaint old town, eating oranges, buying lace, or examining the old church of St. John, with its relics and monuments that carry us back to the middle ages. Another three days’ run and we are landed at Alexandria, and getting our first peep at the East from the top of a donkey. But the train is ready, and we speed through the flat, fertile country watered by the Nile, cross that muddy and venerable stream which has puzzled all the geographers from Herodotus to Livingstone, get a glimpse of the Pyramids in the distance, and cross that terrible desert which is still what it was when Moses led the Israelites through it more than 3000 years ago; and in twelve hours from the time of leaving the Mediterranean, are on board the other mail steamer in the Red Sea. Six days’ run takes us to its mouth, and we are anchored off Aden, a strong military post built on a barren rock, where we stay a few hours for coaling, and then enter on the last stage of our voyage. Five days’ run across the Indian Ocean and we sight the magnificent harbour of Bombay; and then a little steamer carries us all off to the shore, and we are driving to Pallonjee’s Hotel under a fierce sun, tempered only by the sea-breeze, and through streets thronged by motley crowds of natives, in which the few white men are altogether lost.

From Bombay, the Great Indian Peninsular Railway will take you 600 miles in about twenty-five hours to Jubbulpore, up the steep inclines of the Western Ghat mountains, and through the dense jungles and undulating hills of Central India.

Another run of 220 miles takes you to Allahabad, the modern capital of the North-west Provinces, situated at the confluence of the Ganges and Jumna, a great military and civil station, but dusty and disagreeable. Here resides the Lieutenant-Governor of the North-west Provinces, a territory larger than France, with 30,000,000 inhabitants. From Allahabad we may travel south-east to Calcutta, 600 miles distant, passing Benares, the holy city; Patna, famous for opium; and many others; or north-west to Agra, Delhi, and Lahore; the last, 700 miles distant, the capital of the Punjab, where resides another of our great pro-consuls, as Macaulay calls them, _viz._ the Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab.

All these great cities are well worth a visit, containing, as they do, many interesting ruins and architectural remains of the old Hindoo and Mahomedan rulers of the country. Beyond Lahore, where the railway at present terminates, a fine road 260 miles long, will take the traveller across the classic streams of the Punjab, famous for Alexander the Great’s campaigns, up to Peshawur, on the extreme north-west boundary of the empire, where a force of 8000 men keeps watch over the fierce and turbulent races of the neighbouring mountains.

From Umballa, on the Punjab Railway, if the traveller strikes to the east, a good road of 40 miles will take him to the foot of the Himalayahs, whence he can ascend to Simla, situated amongst its groves of pines and rhododendrons, 8000 feet above the sea; and thence through some of the finest mountain scenery in the world, to Cashmere or Thibet, or the frontier of China.

You may vary the homeward route by visiting Calcutta, Madras, and Ceylon, or by going down the Indus to Kurrachee, and thence back to Bombay.

And over all these distances, and through this vast country, the traveller may journey as safely as in any part of Europe, in a healthy, enjoyable climate, if he chooses the proper time, and with his mind expanded by the contemplation of scenery differing widely from anything in the West, and of a state of social and national life which the most superficial glance will assure him is utterly foreign to all his previous experiences.

That, I think, is the chief good of all travel. The experience it brings lifts us out of our old grooves of thought, widens our narrow ideas, teaches us that as God has not made us all with the same coloured skins, so he has given us varieties of national character, which are admirable from their very diversity, and do not make us the less members of one common family, in which He is the great Father of us all.

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For purposes of administration and government India is divided as follows:—The Viceroy and Governor-General of course rules over all, making his head-quarters at Calcutta in the cold weather, and at Simla in the summer. Under him are the Governors of Madras and Bombay, the Lieutenant-Governors of Bengal, the North-west Provinces and the Punjab, with their seats of government at Calcutta, Allahabad, and Lahore respectively; the Chief Commissioners of Oudh, the Central Provinces, Central India, and British Burmah, residing at Lucknow, Nagpore, Indore, and Rangoon; and the Commissioners of Mysore, Hyderabad, and Scinde. Some idea of the extent and importance of these provincial commands may be formed if we consider that Bengal proper, for example, is as large as Germany, and numbers 60 millions of inhabitants.

With regard to the Public Works of the country, their control and direction are confided to a separate department of the State, known as the Public Works Department, at the head of which is a Secretary, styled the Secretary to the Government of India in the P. W. D., and who is, in effect, the consulting engineer and professional adviser to the Viceroy and his council. He is assisted by Deputy-Secretaries for the separate branches of Irrigation, Railways, and Military Buildings.

To the head-quarters of each local government is similarly attached a Secretary, who is at once the mouthpiece and professional adviser of the Lieutenant-Governor or Chief Commissioner, and who, as Chief Engineer, is also head of the whole public works establishment of his province.

Subordinate to him are the Superintending Engineers, who may either have general charge of all the public works of a large district, or, as is more generally the case, are in special charge of some large work, such as a Canal or a Railway. Under the superintending engineers are the Executive Engineers, who are, in effect, the working units of the system. An executive engineer may have a range of new Barracks to build, a line of Road 80 to 100 miles long to keep in repair, or 30 or 40 miles of Canal or Railway to lay out and construct, and for the actual execution of this work he is primarily the responsible man. If the work is a new one, he has to prepare the detailed designs and working drawings under the advice and guidance of his superintendent, to frame the estimates, and to write the reports. When sanctioned, he has to lay out the work, and to find the workmen or contractors to execute it, to control the expenditure, to submit monthly accounts and progress reports, and to conduct a tolerably large correspondence. He will probably have two or three Assistant-engineers, five or six European Overseers, and eight or ten native Sub-Overseers, besides an Office establishment of clerks and accountants.

All the above officials, from the grade of Chief Engineer down to that of Assistant-Engineer, inclusive, are indifferently drawn from officers of the Royal Engineers; Artillery or Line Officers trained at Roorkee; Civil Engineers sent out from England; civilians (European and Native) trained at Roorkee. The promotion from one grade to another is partly by merit and partly by seniority, and has nothing whatever to do with military rank; but care has generally been taken not to have a Royal Engineer officer serving departmentally under his junior.

It may interest some of you if I trace the probable career of a young Royal Engineer, sent to India, say, to what is still called (though improperly) the Bengal Presidency. On landing at Bombay, and reporting himself to the military authorities, he will be directed to proceed to Roorkee, where he will have to do duty with the Bengal Sappers and Miners for a year. This is the order at present, the idea being that in the interval he will acquire some knowledge of the language and of the customs of the country, and, if he is wise, he will make good use of his time; for until he can speak Hindustani pretty fluently, he will find himself very helpless, and all but useless. Roorkee is the head-quarters of the Bengal Sappers, and virtually the head-quarters of the Royal Engineers in the Bengal Presidency. The college over which I have, for some years, had the honour of presiding is at the same station, but is in no way connected with the Sappers, being a public works institution under the civil government, while the Sappers are of course under the Commander-in-Chief.

The Thomason College has been founded about twenty-five years, and now contains about 250 students. There is an engineer class, consisting of a few Artillery and Line officers, and some thirty civilians, who undergo a two years’ training to fit them for the posts of Assistant-Engineers in the P. W. Dept.; another class of officers, who stay only seven months, and are trained for the Quartermaster-General’s Department; a class of soldiers who are trained as Overseers; and a large native class, who are educated as Sub-Overseers, Sub-Surveyors, Estimators, and Draftsmen. Besides the Principal, there are two Royal Engineer Assistants on the staff, two civil Professors of Mathematics and Experimental Science, and two sets of subordinate Masters for the lower classes. There are also a library, model room, and museums in the college, and an excellent press, whence a good many useful works have issued, chiefly relating to Indian engineering.

The Bengal Sappers and Miners are a fine body of men, consisting of twelve companies of native soldiers, recruited from the best and most warlike tribes in Upper India, who have done excellent service wherever they have been employed. Besides their own native officers, English non-commissioned officers are attached to the companies. There is a Commandant, Adjutant, Superintendent of Instruction, and Superintendent of the Park and Field Train, and four doing-duty officers, who are all Royal Engineers, besides the new arrivals attached temporarily to the corps. About half the men are at head-quarters, the remainder in detached companies at Peshawur and elsewhere on the frontier. There is a very fair park and pontoon train attached; also workshops and schools. The men are skilful and intelligent, excellent workmen and good soldiers.

Roorkee also possesses a Foundry and Workshops belonging to Government, which are interesting as having been the first of the kind erected in India, twenty-four years ago, before the introduction of railways. The workmen are all natives, and some of them are remarkably clever and intelligent. They will make anything for anybody, from an iron bridge or a steam engine, down to a railway key; and they turn out excellent spirit levels, prismatic compasses, and so forth. Near Roorkee are also all the greatest works of the Ganges Canal.

Roorkee is a pleasant and healthy station, and many of the young officers stay voluntarily with the Sappers for more than the regular year, as their departmental promotion counts all the same. But generally speaking, before the year is out, the young officer will read in the Gazette of India one fine morning that his services have been placed at the disposal of the P.W. Dept.; and in the next Gazette that he is posted to such or such a province; then a week later, in the local Gazette of that province, he will be posted to a particular circle, and the superintending engineer of that circle will desire him to report himself to some particular executive engineer. The day after his arrival he will find himself employed according to the nature of the work, either surveying and levelling, or drawing plans and making calculations, or in a tent in the middle of the jungles superintending the building of a bridge, with not a soul that can speak a word of English within 30 miles of him. For the next four or five years he will probably be changed about a good deal from one work to another; and if he has proved himself efficient, will then find himself an executive engineer of the fourth grade, and in charge of a division; while, after running through the four executive grades, another ten years or so may carry him on to the higher grade of a superintending engineer.

Generally speaking, a new arrival can select his own line of departmental service, which will depend on his tastes and circumstances. If he has been weak enough to get married before going out, or if he is fond of society, he will select the Military Buildings’ branch, so that he may live in a station; and if he has a speciality for architecture, I should strongly recommend him to do this, for there is a great want of men in that line in India. If, however, he is fond of hard work and knocking about in the jungles, and doesn’t mind a solitary life, he will prefer the Irrigation or Railway branch, and I do not think he will regret his choice, for no man fond of his profession could desire more interesting work, and in the construction of a new line of Canal or Railroad he will every day find scope for his talent or ingenuity or readiness of resource.

Not a few men enter the Survey, which is, however, quite a separate department, divided into three branches,—the Trigonometrical, Topographical, and Revenue,—and the promotion in it proceeds _pari passu_ with that of the Public Works Department.

It may be asked, what are the relations of a Royal Engineer officer, in a department so miscellaneously constituted, to the Civil Engineers and Line officers, with whom he has to work? I think they are generally very friendly and agreeable, and though, of course, it is pleasanter to serve under one’s own brother officers, yet the various members of the department work harmoniously together, and the promotions are generally very fairly made, energetic and clever men being pushed on well.

You will observe that I have said nothing about military engineering works except barracks; in fact, there is very little work of that kind in India. Like the Romans of old, we encamp our troops in open cantonments instead of shutting them up in forts, and what forts there are in the country, for the magazines and arsenals, are almost all old native forts. Of harbour defence works we have scarcely any, for the simple reason that there are scarcely any harbours, except at Bombay, where the subject has recently had much attention directed to it. Whatever military engineering work is required is therefore done as a civil work by the Public Works Department, and all Royal Engineer officers virtually work as civilians, except in the event of war, when those required are at once ordered off to join the army; and though doubtless an officer’s knowledge of military details may be considerably weakened by his long absence from military duty in civil employment, yet the very nature of that employment engenders a quickness and fertility of resource and a sense of responsibility which go far to compensate for that deficiency, and the men who blew in the Cashmere Gate at Delhi, and laid out the defences of the Lucknow Residency, at any rate found their knowledge of military engineering sufficient for the purpose.

What I have already said as to the importance of the work entrusted to every young Government civilian in India applies almost as much to the young Engineer. He will find himself almost immediately entrusted with responsibility, and, before long, in charge of work that he could not expect to have confided to him in England until many years of service had rolled over his head. But with work and responsibility of this nature, he will find great interest and no small anxiety; he will have to look after or do nearly everything himself, without the aid of clever contractors, skilled clerks of the works, and intelligent foremen; he will probably have to train his own subordinates, to work with very inefficient plant, and to trust to his own resources every day, and under circumstances calculated to try his mother-wit, his common sense, and clear-headedness, above all, his patience and temper, in a way he never calculated on. No sort of knowledge will come amiss to him; he may even have to be his own doctor, and to physic his whole establishment, or to commence work by turning wholesale provision merchant in order to supply his workmen in some barren district.

Indeed, the work of an Engineer officer in India, as in England, is of a very miscellaneous description, and I think it is no light subject of pride to the whole corps that there is such a variety of talent amongst our brother officers. In India, when I left the country, besides Lord Napier, whose reputation belongs to the empire, we had the ablest Lieutenant Governor in the late Sir H. Durand, who began his career by blowing in the gates of Ghuznee. One of our officers is Director of Indian Telegraphs another superintends the Great Trigonometrical Survey, perhaps the greatest and most scientific survey ever yet achieved; another is head of the Calcutta Mint; others were amongst the ablest civil commissioners of the country; the astronomical observations of another in connection with the last two eclipses have been of the highest value to science; another has just received the founder’s gold medal from the Royal Geographical Society for his works on antiquarian geography; another has perished a martyr to science amongst the deserts of Thibet; another has established a reputation as the best accountant in India, and has since written the most famous pamphlet of the age.

To complete my account of the Public Work agency, I must very briefly refer to some of the financial aspects of the Department, which concern the engineer. How is the money found for the various works of the country? In this way:—

At the beginning of the financial year, the financial department of the Government of India allots to each local government the several sums that are authorized to be expended during the coming year, for the several works that may have been sanctioned under the various heads of irrigation, railways, roads, barracks, &c. These sums, thus provided in the Public Works Budget, are allotted after due consideration of the various budget estimates that have previously been submitted by the chief engineers of the local governments, and they are not allowed to be exceeded. For this, the superintending and executive engineers are held responsible, and they must “cut their coat according to their cloth,” _i.e._ arrange for the coming year’s work according to the amount of money they are authorized to expend.

Every work is estimated for previous to sanction by the executive engineer, and the estimate, after being checked by the superintending engineer, is forwarded to his chief for sanction, who, if he approve the design and estimate, recommends it for sanction by the local government, or, in case of a large work, forwards it on to the supreme government with his own remarks. If not satisfied with it, he may return it for revision or explanation.

When a work is sanctioned and ordered to be commenced, the money being also forthcoming for it in the budget, the executive engineer goes to work. In the large presidency towns, and a few of the more important stations, he may get the work executed by contract; but, as a general rule, he will have to be content with procuring his materials by contract, and perhaps getting his earthwork done in this manner. For the rest, he will have to employ daily paid labourers, and occasionally may have to import labourers from other districts, to organize them into gangs, provide them with tools, and arrange for their food, water, and temporary shelter. For this he has the assistance of his European overseers, native sub-overseers, and _mistrees_ or head-artificers, and as you will have to deal largely with these men, it may be as well if I say a few words about them.

The European Overseers are nearly all non-commissioned officers or privates who have volunteered from the various regiments in India for the Public Works Department, and have been trained at the Roorkee College. They are allowed to wear plain clothes, and are of course struck off all military duty. As a rule, they are hard-working, intelligent men, and many of them are most valuable subordinates, but they are generally deficient in practical knowledge, are not very conversant with the language, and are but too often given to drink.

The native Sub-Overseers have also been trained at Roorkee, and are generally good draftsmen, surveyors, and estimators, but they are drawn from the trading instead of the working classes, have no practical experience, and lack physical stamina.

The Mistrees, or native head-masons and carpenters, are generally intelligent and good men, quick to learn and easily managed, but few have any theoretical knowledge.

The native labourer is patient, docile, and lazy, never drinks, and is easily managed by anyone who understands him. Perhaps this is a good place to say a word or two about the natives generally, and their treatment by their English masters. Those who have any inherent antipathy to black or brown skins had better not go to India, and those who do go, and are anxious to find faults in the natives, will have no difficulty in satisfying themselves on that score. But, as I have already said, those Englishmen who live most amongst them, and have most to do with them, get to like them most, with scarcely an exception, and I can honestly say, after twenty years’ experience, that I am no exception to the rule. Learn their language well, spend a little time in studying their habits, prejudices, and modes of thought, and I am sure you will find the trouble repaid. If they are not very truthful, are indolent, and sometimes troublesome or even exasperating, it is no light thing that they are singularly temperate, wonderfully patient and good-tempered, very susceptible to kind treatment and good management, and that strikes, drunken brawls, and grumbling discontent are simply unknown.

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Now, after so much preliminary dissertation, we may come to the more professional part of our subject, and I shall begin by making some remarks on the Materials with which the Indian engineer has to work, after which we will proceed to discuss the particular constructions in which they are employed, so far as these present any special points of interest to those conversant with similar structures at home.

There are many varieties of _Stone_ in different parts of India, and it is employed in the various forms of ashlar, rubble, &c., very much as it is in Europe. Granites, limestones, and sandstones are extensively used in the localities where they occur, but the cost of carriage over bad roads to distant places necessarily restricts the employment of this material. In Southern India, laterite, a clay-stone, is extensively used, being easily worked, and becoming hard by exposure to the air. In Upper India, Delhi and Agra are famous for their red sandstone, and Jyepore for its white marble, of which the Taj and other famous buildings are constructed. Bombay has also many varieties of stone, notably the Poree-bunder limestone. Allahabad has some fine quarries of sandstone, of which the new government buildings have been constructed, and I recommend to your notice the account of the working of the Purtarpore Quarries, in the Professional Papers on Indian Engineering, as giving much practical information. Slate is generally scarce and inferior, but some fine quarries have lately been opened out at Dalhousie, and in the Khuttuk Hills, in the Punjab.

There is a kind of soft stone called moorum, found in Central and Western India, which, though almost useless as a building material, is extensively employed for road metalling. Kunkur, too, is quite an Indian speciality, though it is almost entirely confined to the North-Western Provinces. It is a peculiar kind of oolitic limestone, found in beds just below the surface, and is of two kinds; one adapted for building purposes, in which it strongly resembles artificial concrete; the other answering admirably for road metalling, for which purpose it is broken into lumps about the size of an egg, drenched with water, and then rammed until perfectly smooth, after which it is allowed to dry before the traffic comes on it.

The manufacture of artificial stone by Ransome’s process has been tried at Bombay on a small scale, but not with success in an economical point of view.

In the greater part of Upper India, and over much of the rest of India as well, _Brick_ is the chief building material, and there are few engineers in India who will not have much to do with brick-making. I would therefore strongly recommend you to make yourselves well acquainted with the latest improvements in the art, at the same time bearing in mind certain Indian specialities, which will limit the use of many of these methods; these are the cost of carriage, the general absence of coal fuel, the dearness of other fuel, the absence of skilled subordinates, and the disinclination of natives to be driven out of their own customs, and to try experiments. But these circumstances, remember, should only serve to guide your inquiries, on no account to restrain them, for similar difficulties will always be found in the path of improvement everywhere.

You will find very full information on Indian brick-making in the ‘Roorkee Treatise on Civil Engineering,’ and I shall only here advert to a few salient points of the subject.

There is plenty of good brick-earth to be found, but the cost of carriage prevents the same care being taken as at home in the selection and admixture of clays. The clay is often tempered by hand, and then taken straight to the moulding-table; but pug-mills are now pretty common, worked by bullock power. The bricks are usually sand-moulded, and are made of the English size, and stacked in temporary sheds to dry. Brick-making machines have occasionally been tried; but their expense, the difficulty of repair, and the cheapness of hand labour, have always driven them out of the field. Hollow bricks, too, are never seen; and as I think they would be found to be much cooler in the walls of buildings than solid bricks, I would recommend anyone to acquire information of their manufacture and cost.

Bricks are burned in clamps and kilns as in England; but it is only in the neighbourhood of the very few coal localities in India that coal fuel can be used; you will generally have to use wood, or in the case of clamps, dried cow-dung and stable litter, commonly called _oopla_.

At Akra, near Calcutta, there is an extensive Government brickfield, which I advise those of you who are able, to visit; Mr. Hickmott, the superintendent, is a very civil and intelligent man. Hoffman’s kilns have been lately tried, but not very successfully; and I advise you to study the subject, economy of fuel being even more important in India than in England. At the same time, the first cost of construction in this, as in many other instances, must be clearly kept in view; for this cost will have to be added to the cost of your bricks, and as it would not pay to carry bricks far, and Indian distances are long, you cannot afford an expensive construction, however good in itself, which would all fall on the cost of perhaps two or three hundred thousand bricks.

Coloured bricks are nowhere used in India, and their absence is much to be regretted, for they would be most useful both for architectural ornamentation and for floors and similar purposes. The proper clays, on which, as you know, the colours depend, are found in some parts of India; and careful search would doubtless bring to light others;—but here again we are met by the fact that their manufacture requires skill and capital, which are not found on the spot, and would have to be imported. The same remark applies to terra-cotta and encaustic tiles, which would be admirably adapted for Indian use, and would, moreover, stand much heavier transit charges. But the Government cannot be expected to enter the field as manufacturers, and so we must wait, I suppose, for English capital and skill, or for the progress of native enlightenment on these points.

Good ordinary bricks are, however, generally procurable in India, if only proper care be exercised, and a fair price paid for them. The bricklayers require close watching, and often systematic instruction in the all-important subject of bond; for the common native brick is very small, and laid in quantities of mortar with little care about bond; so that native walls are really masses of concrete.

Brick arches are laid, as in England, either in half-brick rings, or, in important works, with the bond carried right through the arch. The natives are very skilful in constructing cheap centerings of dry bricks and wooden soffits, plastered over with mud to the form of the arch, which answer well when your centering is not liable to be carried away by a rush of water. For large arches, whether built with regularly framed timber centres or the common native centres, the French fashion of striking them by means of hollow iron cylinders filled with dry sand, supporting pistons on which the laggings rest, has been largely employed of late, and is much to be commended. You will find it described in Nos. 11 and 24 of the ‘Roorkee Professional Papers,’ as also in the ‘Treatise.’

Masonry made of brick or stone laid in lime mortar is everywhere called _pucka_ masonry. Bricks are, however, often laid in a mortar made simply of thin clay with a little chopped straw in it, and the work is then _kucha-pucka_ masonry. Sometimes sun-dried or unburnt bricks are used, in the case of cheap buildings, for interior walls; or in districts where the rainfall is scant, for exterior walls as well; this is _kucha_ masonry. If well executed, and covered with a leping of clay and cow-dung,—the foundations, tops of walls, and timber framings being finished with pucka masonry—this cheap kind of work answers well in very dry districts, and is cooler than burnt brick.

_Tiles_ are also extensively used in India for roofing purposes, and they are often very badly made. I cannot, however, do more than draw attention to the fact here. You will find plenty of information on the subject in what was once described to me, the author, as “that refreshing work,” the ‘Roorkee Treatise on Civil Engineering.’ The tiles generally used in Government buildings are known as the Goodwyn and Atkinson pattern tile. The hexagonal hollow tile introduced by Colonel Fife for roofing purposes (and known as the Sindh tile), is worth your attention; also the drainage tiles made by Captain Jeffreys for the Ganges Canal. These I mention to illustrate what I have already told you of the necessity of engineers becoming their own manufacturers if they wish to make improvements.

We come now to the subject of _Limes_ and _Cements_, a very important one in India. Lime is obtained in India from the limestone boulders found in hill torrents, from kunkur, from beds of marl, or rather calcareous tufa, and from limestone _in situ_. It is burnt with wood fuel, sometimes in the open, generally in conical kilns, and is mixed with sand, burnt clay, or brickdust, and sometimes other ingredients, to form mortar in the usual way. The best lime is that procured from boulders, which when mixed in the proportion of one part lime to two parts of _soorkee_, or pounded brick, forms an excellent mortar for hydraulic works. Kunkur lime, as a rule, is simply mixed with sand. When lime is burnt with _oopla_, care must be used in sifting and separating it from the ashes of the burnt fuel, otherwise, of course, its strength will be greatly impaired. Artificial cements have scarcely hitherto been made or used in India. You will find a valuable paper on the relative cost of the manufacture and importation of Portland cement, in No. 294 of the ‘Professional Papers’; also another paper by Mr. Price, describing the manufacture of artificial hydraulic lime at Kurrachee. There can be no doubt of the feasibility of the process; but as a rule, the mortars employed, in Upper India, at least, are excellent, if only proper care be used in their preparation. What is chiefly required is a very quick-setting cement or mortar which, even when used in building in water, shall harden in one or two days. This is much wanted for repairs to canal works, where it is often absolutely necessary to turn on the water before the mortar generally employed has had time to set.

Concrete is not very much employed in India, though it has attracted a good deal of attention lately; and some of the works on the new Sirhind Canal were designed to be built almost entirely of it, such as arches of 40 feet span. Indeed, with an abundance of excellent lime, and a great scarcity of fuel, it seems curious that it has not been more extensively used. Concrete blocks were recommended for the great weir over the Ganges, by the Ganges Canal Committee, to be composed of shingle, sand, and lime; and if proper apparatus be used for testing the quality of the lime, there seems every reason to anticipate economy and good work from such a mode of construction.

Lime is also used in stuccoes and plasters much as in England. Madras is noted for this work, where the very beautiful _chunam_ plaster for interiors of rooms, is as smooth, hard, and polished as marble. Coarse sugar and pounded egg-shells are mixed with these more expensive plasters.

Of _Timbers_ there is an immense number in India occasionally used; but practically you will find yourself restricted to a very few varieties, which are the only ones procurable in any quantity. In the Punjab, for instance, the Deodar (Cedrus Deodara) is the principal wood employed, being nearly identical with the famous cedar of Lebanon. It is found in the Himalayan forests, where it is cut, thrown into the rivers, and left there till the succeeding rains swell the stream and carry the logs down below, when it is rafted and floated into the plains. It is a very valuable timber, procurable in great scantlings, and used for every purpose: trees of 7, 8, or 9 feet diameter at the foot, and 70 feet long, are by no means uncommon. In the North-Western Provinces the Saul (Shorea robusta) is the principal tree; it has a long fibrous grain, is straight and strong, of a reddish colour, and very valuable for all purposes.

In Burmah and Western India, the Teak is the principal wood: its many excellent qualities are doubtless well known to you. Other common timbers are the Mangoe, used only for planking or furniture, and readily attacked by insects; the Sissoo or Sheeshum, a hard, strong, but crooked wood, in general request for many purposes, especially furniture, as it takes a beautiful polish; the Keekur or Babool, an acacia, a very hard tough wood, much used for carts; the famous Bombay Black-wood, of which some beautiful specimens of carved furniture are to be seen in the Indian Court of the International Exhibition; the Toon, an inferior mahogany; the Sandal wood, which has a strong perfume, and many others.

Timber in India is generally seasoned by the air or water process, and is occasionally Kyanized or Burnettized. Well-seasoned timber stands the climate well if carefully protected from white ants, those pests of the East. For this purpose, the ends of beams fitting into walls are generally charred and tarred, or the timber is soaked in a solution of sulphate of copper; but the best preservative is carefully to prevent any earth or mud from coming in contact with it. Wooden posts buried in the earth will very soon be useless.

I don’t know that there is anything special to be said about the Indian Carpenters, who are generally very fair, and sometimes very clever workmen, though they _do_ squat on the ground, and hold a piece of wood with their toes while they work the drill by means of a bow and string with their hands. Carpenters’ benches were introduced in the railway workshops at Lahore; but the superintendent told me that he had no sooner turned his back than the men at once proceeded to squat on the benches, so he gave them up in despair.

Of the _Metals_ used by the Indian engineer I need only mention Iron, which is nearly all brought as pig from England. There are valuable iron, copper, and other ores in India; but the great cost of fuel and of carriage have hitherto prevented their being worked extensively. A good deal of native iron is certainly brought into the market, and worked up into tools, straps, bolts, &c.; but nearly all iron roofs and bridges are imported from England; even those made at the Roorkee workshops being manufactured from English iron.

Having now touched very briefly on the chief materials employed, I may usefully give you some information with regard to _Wages_ of workmen and _Cost_ of work. Wages, of course, vary more or less; but the pay of a common labourer all over India may be fairly set down at 2 annas, or 3_d._ a day, and of an ordinary mechanic at 6_d._ to 7½_d._, with which he finds himself in everything. A _beldar_, or navvy, will get 4½_d._, and a skilled carpenter or mason from 9_d._ to 1_s._ These wages seem very low compared with English prices; but you must remember that the men all do far less work than an Englishman; thus, the lowest estimated rate of common earthwork is now about 5_s._ per 1000 cubic feet, which is at the rate of 50 cubic feet only per day for each man of the gang employed.

Of course, I need not trouble you with a long string of rates; I only wish to give you some idea of relative prices and money value. Good ordinary brickwork will cost about 40_s._ per 100 cubic feet; ashlar about 2_s._ per cubic foot; timber-work, 7_s._ per foot, “wrought and put up.”

Taking into consideration the price of food, and other things, we may fairly reckon, I think, the difference in the value of money employed in constructing public works in India and in England as 1 to 4, _i.e._ that a work costing 10,000_l._ in India would cost 40,000_l._ in England.

The Rupee, as you know, is nominally 2_s._, but really varies according to the rate of exchange between 1_s._ 9_d._ and 1_s._ 11_d._ It is divided into 16 _annas_—a copper coin worth about 1½_d._, which is again divided into 12 _pies_, 4 of which make a _pice_. The 2-anna, 4-anna, and 8-anna bits correspond to our 3_d._, 6_d._, and 1_s._ There is no standard gold coinage yet in India, though sovereigns will always pass current, and 5 and 10 rupee coins have lately been issued. There are now Government notes from 10 to 1000 rupees, which pass in all the great towns, but will not be taken in smaller places without a discount.

As to Measures and Weights, in Upper and Western India we employ the lineal, square, or cubic foot as the unit for our estimates and calculations; in Madras, they use the cubic yard. Our lineal units are generally understood, except, perhaps, the mile; natives generally give distances in _kosses_, which vary from 1 to 2½ miles. The acre is employed in Government papers, but is not known to the people, who measure land by the _beegah_, which varies greatly in different districts. The weights commonly used are the _maund_, _seer_, and _chittack_, which are practically held to be 80 lbs. avoirdupois, 2 lbs., and 2 oz. respectively.

There is as great variety in India as in other countries in all local weights and measures, and the people are as obstinate and suspicious there as in England, and elsewhere, about any changes being made,—a fact too often forgotten by the decimal and metrical doctrinaires in their zeal to ensure a theoretically perfect system of standards.

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Let me now say something of the mode of executing work generally, before going on to the subject of special engineering constructions. The first thing that strikes the engineer from England is the primitive simplicity of the working appliances, and the total absence of the elaborate and costly plant judged necessary for executing great works in Europe. Steam engines, steam cranes, steam pumps, steam pile-drivers, tramways, even such things as hand-pumps, horses, carts, and wheelbarrows are rarely used. This has arisen from the comparative cheapness of manual labour, from the difficulty of procuring skilled subordinates, and from the dearness of fuel. Now that the first two causes are greatly modified, and the extensive works lately undertaken have necessitated recourse to European appliances, the engineer going out to India should devote special attention to this subject, for he will often have to teach his subordinates the use of such things as I have mentioned. Great works have, however, been constructed in India without them, and will still be so for some time to come. Earthwork, for instance, is constructed almost entirely with wicker baskets as the sole means of carriage; yet few countries have had so many massive embankments thrown up. Petty contracts are readily taken for this kind of work, in which case the whole family of the workman, down to the child of three years old, will help to swell the mass to be raised. A system of payment at the rate of a _cowrie_ paid on the spot for every basket of earth carried is very popular, several hundred cowries going to a rupee. For such banks, the earth is almost always taken from side cuttings to save the expense of a long lead, as the land is comparatively of little value. The earth is dug with a _phowrah_, the common native tool, which is at once a spade and a hoe, and an excellent tool it is.

For getting water out of foundations, and for lifting water generally either for irrigation or otherwise, several ingenious contrivances are employed. For a lift not exceeding three or four feet, and where the hole or excavation is not too small, a swing-basket covered with leaves or matting is used as a bale, being swung by two men. I have often seen water lifted in this way from 12 to 16 feet, in three or four stages, by as many pairs of men, the baskets being swung together in exact time, and the quantity lifted one stage being about 1800 gallons per hour.

For higher lifts, there are three machines commonly employed—the _paecottah_, or lever bucket, used in Bengal (the counterpoise on the shorter arm of the lever being a heavy stone or a lump of clay); the _churus_, or _chursah_, common in the North-Western Provinces, a large leathern bag drawn up by bullocks; and the Persian wheel, or endless chain of buckets, also worked by bullocks, and everywhere employed in the Punjab, which has been in use in the East for at least 2000 years, and is one of the most effective and ingenious water-raising engines yet invented.

The native carts or hackeries are drawn by bullocks or buffaloes, and are exceedingly primitive vehicles. They have no springs—often no iron tires to the wheels—and, except the axle-pins, have generally no iron at all in them. But the advantage is that they can go over any rutted track that does duty for a road, and that if they do get broken, the nearest carpenter can repair them. That, of course, is the real difficulty in introducing English improvements into India, that if your fine carts or pumps get broken, who is to repair them?[A]

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I now come to a very interesting subject to the Indian engineer, which involves several specialities, and applies more or less to all the constructions we shall consider afterwards in detail—I mean the subject of _Foundations_. Of course the general principles of constructing foundations are the same everywhere, that is, you must secure, if possible, a firm and unyielding substratum. If you cannot find this naturally supplied, you must use artificial contrivances, either by proper distribution of your weight to be supported, or by preventing any lateral spreading, or undermining from the action of water. For this purpose in England we have recourse to piling, or concrete, or iron cylinders and screw-piles. How is it in India? Well, there, as a rule, piles won’t do; first, because timber is scarce and dear; second, and chiefly, because it is exposed to so many causes of decay that it would quickly rot. Iron cylinders and screw-piles have been a good deal used lately; but generally in India, both these and the timber piles are superseded by the employment of Cylinders of Brick masonry, varying in diameter inside from 3 to 12 feet, and sunk either to a firm stratum below, or to such a depth as to be safe from scour,—the weight being borne in this case by the friction against the sides. A sufficient number of wells are designed to carry the superincumbent weight, whether it be a house or the pier of a bridge, and the whole series being sunk to the required level, and as close together as possible, the tops of the wells are arched over, the arches are all connected together by slabs of stone or other arches, and on this artificial platform the superstructure is raised.

To sink a well, the _néemchuk_, or well-curb, a ring of wood from 9 to 18 inches thick, is laid on the ground, the masonry built upon it about 4 feet high, and left to dry. The sand inside is then scooped out, and the well descends gradually, when another 4 feet are built up; the sand is again scooped out; and so on, until the required depth is reached. So long as there is no water met with, and the soil is sand, the work is easy enough, the only care being to see that the excavation proceeds regularly and evenly; but when the water is reached, and as it deepens, the process is a slow one. A huge sort of hoe (called a _jham_) is used, which is worked from above into the soil, and then hoisted up with its load; a Persian wheel or a _churrus_ being also used to keep the water down as much as possible. Sometimes blocks of wood or kunkur are met with which impede the descent of the well, and then a diver must be employed,—a man who descends without any diving apparatus, and can stay under water an alarming length of time.

Since the construction of so many great railway bridges, in which these cylinders have been sunk to a depth of 50 feet, various improvements have been introduced. The wooden curb has been replaced by one of wrought iron, with a sharp-cutting edge, into which are bolted below several rods of inch iron running through the masonry, and connected at intervals by flat iron rings, so that the whole cylinder is well bound together. A Sand Pump has also been invented, worked by a steam-hoist, to take the place of the old native _jham_. This, and another machine for the same purpose, called Fouracre’s Well Excavator, you will find described in the ‘Professional Papers’ and the Roorkee ‘Treatise.’

Sometimes, instead of a series of separate wells, the whole mass of a pier has been built in a block, with hollows at intervals, and sunk together by several parties of well-sinkers. In this way the piers of the great Solani Aqueduct, at Roorkee, were constructed and sunk 20 feet; but this work requires very experienced men, and is subject to such risks that, as a rule, separate wells are preferred.

Such work as the above can only be carried on when the river is low, and the current very slack, and this may be a good place to speak of the general nature of such Indian Rivers. I refer chiefly to such streams as the Ganges, Jumna, Indus, and others, as there are few things of more vital interest to the Indian engineer.