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350 HISTORY OF THE INDIAN NAVY.

lying at that place seventeen Joasmi sail, having on board five
or six thousand men, returning from El Kateef,* where they
had arrived too late to aid the Wahabee chief against Ibrahim
Pasha. Captain Barnard, as in duty bound, respected the
neutrality of the port—though it was notorious that the pirates
disposed of a large proportion of their plunder in Bahrein—and
accordingly sailed from thence in order to allow the Joasmi
armament to quit the island. This they did, and some of their
ships, proceeding across to the Persian coast, continued their
depredations.
On her arrival in the Gulf, the 'Eden,' under instructions
from the Bombay Government, accompanied by the ' Conway,'
and the Hon. Company's cruisers, ' Benares,' ' Mercury,' and
'Antelope,' proceeded to Bahrein in February, 1819, and, after
some negotiations, the Sheikh succeeded in convincing Captain
Loch that the report regarding the European females was
incorrect, and. at the same time entered into an agreement to
abstain from receiving captured British property in his
territory, though of course, suo more, he paid no heed to his
engagements directly the British squadron had sailed. At
Captain Loch's request the Sheikh communicated with Hussein-
bin-Rahmah, the Ras-ul-Khymah chief, offering, on the part of
the British Government, the release of a number of Joasmi
prisoners in exchange for native women captured by the pirates,
and eventually the proposal was agreed to, and seventeen poor
creatures were restored to liberty. Before quitting Bahrein,
Captain Loch again connnitted a mistake, owing to his perversity
and ignorance of Persian Gulf politics, in which he was too
proud to take advi(;e from the commanders of the Company's
cruisers. The British Native agent at Bahrein informed him
there were some Joasmi vessels in the southern anchorage,
which the Sheikh and his Ministers strenuously denied, declaring
them to be belong to the Beni Yas tribe, whose chief port is
Abu Thubi. But the senior officer, though warned of the
mistake he was about to commit, sent the boats of the squadron,
under cover of the 'Antelope,' to cut them out; a stout
Gombroon, or Bunder Abbas, and its dependencies, a tract of about ninety miles.
His commerce was considerable, and, in 1820, he bad five ships, including the
' Shah Alum ' of fifty-six guns and the ' Caroline,' thirty-six guns ; also two
large baghalahs and four batils, his prirate property, besides being able to com-
mand all the vessels of his subjects.
* El Kateef town is on the west side of the bay of the same name, on the
mainland, near tlie island of Bahrein. The bay is large and unsafe for ships.
Tlie town holds a prominent place in old histories and voyages of the Persian
Gulf, particularly during the Portuguese tenure of Ormuz. For a detailed
account of the Portuguese operations against El Kateef and Bahrein, see Manuel
de Faria y Sousa's " Portuguese Discovery and Conquest of Asia," in Vol. vi. of
Kerr's " Collection of Voyages and Travels." The conquest of those places was
undertaken in the same year that Camoens, the immortal author of the " Lusiad,"
sailed for India to advance by the sword the fortune which had been so little
promoted by his pen.