Page 341 - Gulf Precis(VIII)_Neat

ay
/j^.—There should be a Vice-Consul under the Minister at Rushire, and who,
though directly subordinate to the Foreign Office, might correspond
upon Gulf affairs with the Chief at Mussundooin.
$• The proposed settlement would flourish, I think, under any officer who would
use common sense on its administration, and leave commerce and people in general
to manage their own business. Perhaps, however, an officer who had been trained in a
good school for general administration would be pcrfcrablc to a mere diplomatist or a
pure soldier, for the former is, perhaps, a little too prone to fancy work done when he
has given the last polish to his despatch ; and the latter, perhaps, occasionally forgets
that Martial Law and the Habeas Corpus Act cannot co-exist in one and the same juris­
diction.

P.S.—Since writing this letter I have received and am transmitting Mr. Eastwick’s
despatch, No. 7, of 18th December 1862, advocating the establishment of a Vice-Admiralty
Court for the Persian Gulf, &c. It is, I believe, questionable whether we have a right to
establish such a Court on foreign soil ; but the natural point for such a Court would be
the settlement at Mussundoom. In brief, wherever I turn,, I find reasons for selecting
that as our fulcrum of influence in the Gulf, provided always that the climate be suffi­
ciently bearable.
The whole drift, indeed, in Mr. Eastwick’s despatch is to show the embarrassments
which surrounded the administration of justice towards British subjects on Peisian
■oil. I really cannot difine what my magisterial powers are as a Resident at Bushire ;
n°r do I perceive in what way 1 could punish a criminal. So far as iny personal obser­
vation in Persia goes, I am disposed to think that our relations with this Government in
regard to judicial matters are on a vague and unsatisfactory footing; and that the obtain-
ment of justice for a British subject depends more upon the personal influence which
British representatives may possess with the Persian authorities, than upon the real
merits of the plaintiff's case. AH this (in so far as the precincts of the Gulf are concerned)
would be obviated by having our own port and settlement in the Gulf. I do not lay much
stress on oaths as Mr. Eastwick seems to do. In my opinion, a law of perjury operates
much like a law of usury.

Since writing the foregoing I have received reliable intelligence of a point on the
southern entrance of Elphinstone Inlet, which seems well suited to the requirement above
enumerated.

No. 6-A., dated Bushire, the 16th February 1863.
From— Lieutenant-Colonel Lewis Pblly, Acting Political Resident, Persian Gulf,
To—The Hon’blb Henry I.acon Anderson, Chief Secretary to Government, Bombay.
I think the accompanying map* may illustrate
* I beg the favor of the return of this map to to Government some of the points noticed in
me.
my letters No. i-A. and No. 3-A.
Government will observe that for a Resident at'Bushire, the nearest point of his
general work is Bahrein over the water : the
Nearly two hundred mile* of sea distant.
map now sent shows that distance as the
radius of the black circle.
Were the Resident centered at Cassab, on the Mussundoom Promontory, not only
would he hold there his Residency, the Tele­
Ras-al-Khyma, Amulgsvine, Ejiaao, Debaye, graph, and Coal Depflt, but the same radius of
Aboothabee, all Maritime Arabs.
distance would embrace the districts of all the
Arab Chiefs now enumerated, and would find them on the same shore with the Resident.
It would further embrace our Agencies at Lingah and Bassadore; our commercial interests
at Bunder Abass ; our political influence in Western Mekran. It would comprehend finally
the command of the Gulf entrance for trade and anti-slavery purposes during peace ; for
military purposes in war.
I have reliable ground for supposing that a point near Cassab, at the outer entrance
of the Elphinstoue Inlet, near Cape Mussundoom, is suitable to our object.
I respectfully add a few disconnected results of thought bearing upon the question
of the Persion Gulf trade and line of communication.
When it was decided that the Imaumship of Muscat should henceforth be the two
independent Sultanuts of Zanzibar and Muscat, that State, which had previously been a first-
rate Asiatic Maritime Power, declined at such. While the Tmaum held his richest territories
in Africa, it was essential to maintain a flee^ for political ends and to encourage traders.
The genius of the Government as of the people was turned, to seafaring. The Asian
and African possessions mutually supplied and enriched each other ; they formed the
web and woof of the home trade; now that these possessions are severed, and that, in