THE INDIAN PENINSULA 13Q

it bears the name of Wandan ; through Bhawalpur, where
the name Hakro reappears, . . . thence through the north
of Bikanir, and onwards beyond Rajputana to the foot of
the Himalaya.” Whether this river can be identified
with an ancient course of the Sutlej, or can be connected
with the Ghaggar east of the Sutlej (which now disappears
in the sands of Rajputana), rather than with the Indus,
may still be questioned ; but General Haig considers that
“it is certain that the Hakro of lower Sind was formerly
a part of the course of an independent stream, the drying
up of which has been calamitous, not only in reducing
thousands of square miles of once fertile land and inhabited
 country to waste and solitude, but also in forcing
a vast additional body of water into the already overcharged
 channel of the Indus, thus enormously increasing
the risk of desolating floods along the lower course of that
river.”
The risk of desolating floods is still further increased
by the action of the river in depositing vast quantities of
silt, which have a tendency to gradually raise the level of
the channel. Thus the Indus and other Himalayan-bred
rivers liable to yearly flood usually acquire a channel
level which is considerably higher than the plains on
either side of them, and the area of land subject to inundation
 is thereby enormously increased. The floods of
the Indus extend to the foot of the Baluchistan hills, and
it is no uncommon occurrence for the line of railway
connecting Jacobabad with Quetta to be so deep under
water as to render it impossible to maintain traffic. The
remains of Indus-built boats have been dug up far to the
west of Jacobabad, and these relics are old enough to
indicate either that the deep-water Indus floods have
spread through the Kachi of Gandava from very ancient
days, or that there was once a western branch of the river.
In direct connection with the river systems of India
we may well consider the general geographical conformation
 of those districts which they water and sustain,
The Punjab, the native state of Bhawalpur, Rajputana,
and Sind are all of them within the Indus basin: all of