Page 136 - The Pirate Coast (By Sir Charles Belgrave)

served in European style, at a table provided with plates, knives
and forks, the guests sat on chairs. Shaikh Abdul Rasool must
have been very advanced, and familiar with Western ways, for
only thirty years ago, a meal served in European style would have
been most unusual in an Arab or Persian house in the Gulf. The
Shaikh sat on a chair at the side of the room, joining in the con­
versation, and giving orders to the servants, but not partaking of
the meal. Some old-fashioned Arabs still keep to this custom,
but today an Arab host usually sits and cats with his guests.
The menu included kabobs, stewed meats, chickens with rich
fruit sauce, and a roast kid stuffed with peaches, nuts and rice.
For dessert, there were figs, green almonds, and many kinds of
preserved fruits. The beverages consisted of different kinds of
sherbets, one was made from the seed of a species of willow,
‘which gave it a most delicious flavour’, and red and white Shiraz
wine. Sir Robert Ker Foster, who travelled in Persia at this time,
says that the wine was manufactured in secret by Armenians, and
that ‘when good it should be a little sweet, with the flavour of dry
Madeira*. Loch says that the red Shiraz wine was from the same
vineyards which supplied the vines which were imported to
Constantia, at the Cape of Good Hope, which produce the finest
South African wine.
The Shaikh sat smoking and talking during the meal, but every
now and then he left the room, ‘for the purpose of taking some
deep draughts of his favourite Shirazi, which was evident on his
return, for his intoxication was apparent*. Musicians played and
sang during dinner, one of their drums was ‘not unlike, in size and
shape, the fig drum of Smyrna*, others were made from coconut
shells covered in parchment. Loch had no appreciation of ‘the
uncouth sounds’ of Oriental music. The party ended with fire­
works, ‘which were but a poor display’, although the Bushiris
thought them ‘exceedingly grand.... We returned in the even­
ing to the Residency, very much pleased with our entertainment,
the Shaikh appearing no less so.’
One of the principal exports from Bushirc was horses: they
were raised on the plains of Kazaroon, and were a cross-breed of
Arab and Turkoman stock. Many of the more wealthy Persians
in the neighbourhood of Bushirc were engaged in breeding and
trading in horses. Loch often watched them being shipped from
Bushire, and he noticed the cruel manner in which they were
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