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.
* * * * *
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.
* * * * *