Excepting the Indus, the engines of which are a hundred horse power, and the Nimrod and Assyria of forty each, others are of sixty horse power; the Chenab and Jhelum are the only two that are pressed high. Of these iron steamers, the Manet and Satellite have been on the river ever since 1842; they were originally intended by all accounts for the Rhine, or some other river on the continent of Europe; the East India Company, however, were induced to purchase their sections, and have them put up in the dockyard at Bombay for the Indus. The next three, the Napier, Conqueror, and Meanee, came up between 1844-45. The Nimrod and Assyria, originally intended for, and at one time on the Euphrates, were sent down about a couple of years ago to Bombay, where they were lengthened twenty feet, and then transferred to this flotilla. The three last are new boats, and though the Indus is considered a sort of yacht in preference to the Meteor, she is generally employed as a tug to some one of the flats, the Chenab and Jhelum being also used in the same way. The two last have of late been specially put on the line between Kurrachee and Mooltan for the couveyance of goods.
Most of these steamers are too old for any service. The Conqueror, for instance, was in that condition the other day that with every foot of water she gained, the blacksmith's forge was in constant requisition; she is said to require thorough repair, so that until next season her services are wholly lost. In the anxiety to maintain a steam communication on the Indus, the peculiar characteristics of the stream do not seem to have been consulted in the construction of these particular steamers. The Indus, unlike most rivers, does not run in one uniform bed, but spreads itself over a vast plain, forming two or three channels of various depths. Parties competent to express an opinion, urge in consequence that the draft of water of these steamboats should never exceed three feet for either high or low water, and that the steam pressure should always be high.
All these steamboats are considered tenders to the Mootnee, the flag-vessel at Kotri, and therefore fly a pennant.