Part 4

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.