Page 352 - PERSIAN 1 1873_1879 Admin Report1_Neat

]0 V ADMINISTRATION REPORT OP TIIP. PERSIAN OIJI.F POLITICAL RESIDENCY

the greater part of the year. In winter, like the rest of the population,
they suffer from ague; and in the hot season the effects of heat tell more
on them than on any other class, which may he partly clue to the badly
ventilated rooms they live in. They generally lead a sedentary lift*,
their oceupatinn being like that of the Khojias principally of shop-keeper*
and merchants. The elTeets of climate would seem in their case to lead
to premature decay and old age.
The Jults, or Zatoots, as the Arabs call them, form a class by th cm-
selves, and are the descendcnts of the Jutts who emigrated a thousand
years ago from India. Although Mahomedans, they are looked down upm
by their co-religionists as a degraded class, and arc thus kept socially to
themselves. They are divided into Arab Zatoots and llcloochee Zatoots,
and their total number may he computed to lx» about 200.
A few Persians, about 100, live permanently in Muscat; some arc
in the service of the State as gunners, whilst others are tisbermeu and
small traders.
Of the unfixed portion of he population, the Bedouin Aml>s and
pilgrims to Mecca from India, t jrsia, Afghanistan and Central Asia,
are the only two important classes. The Arabs from the interior seek
relief princi]>al]y for imjjotonce, rheumatic pains, and hypertrophy
of the spleen. Amongst the Indian pilgrims, the Bengalee, whose system
seems to be highly charged with malaria, suffers perhaps more than
any other class of pilgrims. Scurvy and scorbutic diseases induced prin­
cipally during the voyage from Jeddah or Aden to Muscat, or from
India to Muscat, prevail most commonly amongst the Indian pilgrims.
Scorbutic and aincmic ulcers are also very common, and other skm
disease*:, such as pruritus and eezocma may be traced to a great want of
jH.TSimal cleanliness.
/JirrUiiitj.r //;o/ .S'VcW.t.—well-to-do classes live in houses built
principally of mud and sandstone, with a small court-yard in the
centre; the houses are square shaped and have no compounds attached to
them. The rooms are built generally in a square form round this
court-yard ; most of the houses are one-storied, the lower rooms being
occupied either by servants or appropriated for warehouse purposes. The
roofs are flat and surrounded by small walls on all sides, which renders
them highly convenient and comfortable to sleep upon during summer;
they arc plastered over, which renders them a perfect protection from
rain, and the scorching heat of the sun in hot weather. Small temporary
sheds of date branches are generally built on the roofs during the hot
weather as a protection from dew, which is rather heavy at that time or
the year. The walls arc mostly thick, and are not easily heated even
when the hot dry wind is blowing. The ventilation in almost all the
houses is good, the windows and doors, although small, being sufficient
in number to keep a constant current of air. Outside the town the
j>oorer classes live in huts built of date sticks and matting; the ven­
tilation, owing to the small open interspaces is free and constant, ha
during the hot weather the temperature inside i9 very high, from t *
thatched roofs affording little protection from direct rays of the sun,
and in winter, at night especially, when the worth-west wind **
blowing, the cold is rather trying.