Page 388 - PERSIAN 2C 1890_1899_Neat

10 ADMINISTRATION REPORT ON THB PERSIAN GULP POLITICAL
£
met by colling in a part of tho copper and fixing the rate provisionally at 80
Shahis for the kran.
His Royal Highness Hissam-es-Sultaneh, who, at the close of tho year
1805-90, was appointed to the Governorship of Bushire and the Golf Ports
proceeded in a very leisurely manner to the scat of his authority, not arriving
at Bushiro till the middle of June.
Complaints were made hy tho mail steamer agents of extreme difficulty
and delay in the discharge of cargo in September, followed hy a joint protest
hy all the British firms against the injury thus suffered.
In January the Indo-European Telegraph Station at Reshire, 5 miles from
BuBhire, was the scene of a serious mob outrage. After some premonitory
menaces, a moh consisting of several hundreds, of whom many were armed
with guns, rushed to the destruction of the .bonoh marks of the recently
completed longitude operations, close to the main building. Resistance was
out of the question, and the mob, after effectingjthe wreck of these marks, pro­
ceeded to the tidal observatory by the sea, where they similarly destroyed the
tidal level record. The outrage which was instigated by the Syeds was in pur­
suance of a vulgar superstition, that these record marks had been the cause of
the deficient rainfall. At the close of the year the mutilated scientific records
were formally replaced.
In the early cold weather the appearanco of tho plague at Bombay neces-
sitated the adoption of quarantine precautions. The resources of the Persian
Government were unequal to the inauguration of efficient measures, and the
onus devolved on this Residency. Quarantine was eventually placed on a
satisfactory and efficient footing at Bunder Abbas, Lingah, and Mohammerah,
for which the services of Assistant Surgeons were lent by the • Government of
India, as well as at Bushire.
Kishm Island was visited by a terrible calamity. On the night of the 11th
January an earthquake laid the town in ruins, only two musjids and three or four
other buildings being left standing. Sixteen hundred bodies were reported to have
been recovered from the ruins, besides those of strangers which were not identi­
fied. Shocks were felt as far as Lingah to the west, and on the neighbouring
Island of Larak.where some loss of life was also reported.
9.—PERSIAN BALUCHISTAN AND MEKRAN.
At Charbar there was serious and long-continued trouble regarding rival
olaims to the subsidies paid by the Telegraph Department, in consideration of
protection for their land line. The superior provincial authority at Bampur,
being itself at one time contested and in doubt, the subordinate local Chiefs
who are the recipients of the Telegraph subsidies, were in conflict in regard to
the title to the payments as derived from one or other of the contending
superiors. The position was hy no means an easy one for the Telegraph
Superintendent, on whom the rival demands were constantly pressed. The
matter was shortly afterwards settled for the time, by payment for the half-year
up to June 1890, being made to Mohamed Khan, one of the claimants,'.whose
title seemed to be the most in order. In February of 1897 there was a recrudes­
cence of the 6ame dispute, and it was ner- jsary, in order to avoid the risk of
misohief, to make the next payment to another candidate, who appeared to
have substantial support..
10.—SLAVE TRADE. .
An increased activity in the slave trade has already been commented upon
above