Page 260 - Gulf Precis (I-A)_Neat

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OXLIV.
Hon'ble If. Grenville to Peter Elwin Wrenou, Esq.*. at Bassora.

8ir,
Why and how a A few Days agoo Your Letter of the 20ih_ July oatno to my hands m-
i
waa'obtby tho forming mo of your hoing appointed Agent for the E. I. Company’s Affairs at
for1th^Ac“^t,a“,lor Bassora on the departure of M_L. Price, & of your having taken upon you
!
SwTfor iu t!*°* N,e oxeoution of that Charge, Consequently in all future concerns of the Com­
pany at the porto (which have for some Months past been neither unim­
portant, nor few, & which have more than sufficiently ongag’d my Time,
my thoughts, & my Pon) I shall address my Dispatches to You; I shall
make no recapitulation here of the several Steps, I have been pursuing at the
porte in the Service of the Company’s Affairs there; As my past dispatohos
to Ml,. Lystor & Ml. Garden will have given you all fitt & uecessary
Lights upon that Subject, & more especially as I now transmitt You here­
with Duplicates of my last Letters to Ml.. Girdon of the 1“‘- & 7kh- August
the better to Guard against the ill consequences of any Miscarriage upon
the road, tho’ certainly when Icoasider the Bearer of those Dispatches, nothing
of that Sort is to be apprehended:
From those Dispatches You will have learnt the difficulties I have had to
encounter at tho Porte, the Scenes of entanglements which I found myself
engag’d ia with the Yizier, ’ere I cou’d work out an accomplishment of the
great objeot in view, & obtain leave for dispatching away an Officer of Dis­
tinction from the porte, & making him the Bearer of tho Portes Commands
to Bussora: at length however I succeeded; fortunately I have prov’d a
Successful Negotiator at the Porte, & much I hope that this Officer will prove
as successful a Messenger of the Company’s Service, and for all parties
interested; whioh I shall wait with eager impatience tq be inform’d of. From
those Dispatches too, You will have learnt that I was still labouring to
succeed at the Porte in that very difficult pinch of Business, so often spoken
of allready in my former Dispatches, & now at length happily obtain’d, I
mean a Consulary Birat from the porte for the Company’s Agents at Bassora ;
It is a real satisfaction to me thus to have it in my power, in tho first Letter
I write, & in the first opening of my Correspondence with You, to congratu­
late you on this Event; I have all along look’d upon a Consulary Birat from
the Porte as an object of such an high & concernment to the Company’s
Interests in the Ottoman Dominions at all times, & particularly in the present
Hour, amidst the present Distraotions & Irregularities of Government at
Bussora, that I determin’d to leave no effort unemploy’d whioh cou’d possibly
effect my Success : It i6 the Surest & most efficaoious means that he know
of in this part of the World, for protecting the Company’s Commerce their
property, & just rights; it seoures to them for ever & more firmly than any
thing else can, a perraamont & quiet residence at Bassora for their future
Agents there, it silences for ever that new fangled but dangerous Doctrine
at the Porte, the annual change of them. It is what has been ever praotia’d
by the Lerant Company in almost all the considerable Scales of the Lerant
for the sake of their Commercial Affairs, and by these means it is that their
Consuls seldom or never meet with Molestation in their respective Establish­
ments : The expediency & advantage of such a Birat is manifest & Clear;