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Appendix No. 4.
CYPRUS.
Outer harbour.
craft could lie alongside the quay spaces on either side of and between the jetties. These works, with the necessary landing-sheds and other accessories, may be carried out at a cost of about 50,0001.
To afford protection to the outer harbour to the extent above proposed it would be necessary to carry a breakwater along the eastern reef for a length of from 1,800 to 2,200 yards. This may be con- structed from time to time, as the requirements of the service may demand. The first, or southern portion, for a length of 1,200 yards, is formed in an average of 9 feet of water, while the northern portion averages about 22 feet in depth. Such a harbour would, according to Admiral Hornby's Report to the Admiralty of date 20th January last, allow fourteen iron-clads to moor and swing to their anchors, while, were they moored head and stern, as is done in the harbour of Alexandria, the accommoda- tion would be largely increased. It is believed that such a harbour would, as regards accommodation, perfect shelter, and facility of access in all states of the weather, both by day and night, be second to none in the Mediterranean.
Inclosure 3 in No. 70.
Report on the Sanitary Condition and Drainage of the District of Famagusta and the Mesaoria in Cyprus. By the Chevalier David Bocci.
[Not printed.]
(Confidential.)
No. 71.
War Office Memorandum on Defence of Cyprus.
THERE are five ports or anchorages on the coast of Cyprus, viz., Kyrenia, on the north; Papho, on the west, Larnaka and Limasol on the south; and Famagusta, on the east.
Kyrenia and Papho are small commercial ports, more or less choked up with silt and sand, and suitable only for the reception of coasting-vessels of light draught.
Larnaka and Limasol are the two chief resorts for commercial shipping, the latter being now used as the landing-place for military stores, &c. They are merely open anchorages off the towns of those names, and are much exposed to the east and south-east gales which are occasionally experienced there in winter.
The port of Famagusta on the other hand, although of little present commercial importance, affords, owing to the presence of an outlying line of reef and shoal ground, secure anchorage for vessels drawing 4 fathoms. This line of reef, moreover, offers unusual natural facilities for the formation of a breakwater, by which a harbour could be readily inclosed capable of giving shelter to a squadron of the largest iron-clads.
Famagusta, therefore, is the port best adapted for military occupation. It is with it alone that this Memorandum deals.
The town, or what remains of it, for it is described as being in ruins, was built some 800 years ago. Roughly speaking, it is a parallelogram in plan, having a fortified perimeter of nearly 4,000 yards in length. The present fortifications (which, if not originally constructed by the Genoese, were much strengthened by them) consist of continuous lines of escarp wall with flanking projections at intervals of semicircular or bastioned trace. The walls are stated to be 17 feet thick, to be well and solidly built of stone, and still in a fair state of preservation. The east or sea face of these works stands on the extreme margin of the shore line. The three landward faces are surrounded by a ditch hewn out of the rock about 80 feet wide and 25 feet deep, into the lower parts of which the sea at one time flowed.
On the sea face is a citadel or keep, which is isolated from the rest of the works by a wet ditch. Two entrances only communicate between the town and the outside, one on the land side near the south-west angle, and one on the seaward side to the south of the citadel.
The town is stated to have at one time contained some 30,000 Venetian inhabitants. Five hundred Mahommedans are all that now find shelter amid its ruins. Owing to its proximity to undrained marshes, to fouled sources of water supply, and to defective drainage, the town is now most unhealthy. An insight into its condition in this respect may best be gained by quoting from a Memorandum* dated October 1878:-
"Of the 300 male inhabitants every one has had this season the fever, two-thirds are still suffering with it (i.c., end of October 1878). One-half of the population have opthalmia, and about one-sixth are suffering from a disease of the eye causing opacity of the pupil and subsequent blindness.
"In the flourishing days of Famagusta the city was drained; these drains are now choked, and nearly obliterated, but their traces are to be seen under the walls on the shores of the port. At the present time every habitation has a cesspool in some part of its courtyard or inclosure, a hole merely dug in the friable porous soil; no attempts are made to cement the sides to prevent percolation; when filled, another hole is dug near, and possibly at no distance from the well of drinking water. The aque- duct illustrates the spongy nature of the ground; it is not led to the sea, but is allowed to lose itself in the earth."
To the south-west of the town, at a distance of about 1,400 yards from the fortifications, are built the suburbs of Upper and Lower Varoshia, the inhabitants of which, chiefly Chritsian, exceed 2,000 in number.
* Hydrographer to the Admiralty and Staff Commander Millard, R.N.
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