INLAND NAVIGATION.

15

of which is raised above the level of the ground about it, to serve them incases of necessity: besides, they have every where in the provinces ofXensi and Xansi, for want of rain, certain pits from twenty to a hundredfeet deep, from which they draw water with incredible labour. If bychance they meet with a spring of water, it is worth observing how care-fully they husband it; they sustain it by banks in the highest places ;they turn it here and there an hundred different ways, that all the coun-try may reap the benefit of it; they divide it by drawing it by degrees,according as every one hath occasion for it; insomuch that a smallrivulet, well managed, sometimes dispenses fertility to a whole province.”

To the above accounts of the canals of China I shall now add somedescription of those in other parts of Asia, which, I doubt not, will behighly acceptable to the curious enquirer on this subject, as it tends toshew the skill and intelligence of the natives of that quarter of the globe,their ideas of the advantages of inland commerce, and with what indefa-tigable industry they have laboured to promote it. The following ac-count of the canals and inland navigation of Hindoostan, or the Mogulempire, more commonly known by the name of Bengal, is extractedfrom Mr. Rennel’s Memoirs of Hindoostan, published in 1788.

" The countries between Delhi and the Panzab being scantily suppliedwith water, the emperor Ferose III. undertook the noble as well as usefultask of supplying it better, and at the same time meant to apply thewater so furnished to the purposes of navigation. Dow (vol. i. p. 327)translates Ferishta thus:

" In the year 1355, Ferose marched to";Debalpour, where he made acanal one hundred miles in length, from the river Suttuluz to the riverIidger. In the following year between the hills Mendouli and Sirmore,he cut a canal from the river Jumma, which he divided into seven streams,one of which he brought to Hassi, and from thence to Beraisen, where

he built a strong castle, calling it by his own name. He drew soon after

a canal