Page 176 - The Pirate Coast (By Sir Charles Belgrave)

CHAPTER XIII

'The Khali fall family, if we except certain dis­
sipated habits, accounted for, though hardly
excused, by wealth and power, are a very toler­
able set of men.’
Central and Eastern Arabia: \V. G. Palgravc - 1865

‘The moon hath risen clear and calm,
And o’er the Green Sea palely shines,
Revealing Bahrein’s groves of palm,
And lighting Kishma’s amber vines.’
Lallali Rookh: George Moore - 1816

T" OCH’S next assignment was a mopping-up expedition.
|| After Ras al Khaima was taken, news was received that some
_yjoasmi ships had left the Pirate Coast before the arrival of
the British expedition, and were sheltering in Persian ports and at
Bahrain. It was thought that they might form the nucleus of a
new pirate fleet, so Loch was given orders to hunt them out and
destroy them. He left Ras al Khaima on January 3rd 1820, with
1 Bruce on board, accompanied by the Curlew and the Nautilus.
The squadron spent two weeks cruising along the Persian coast,
during which time they met the full force of the winter gales.
I They passed Kliarak Island, whose inhabitants, Locli was told,
‘have red hair and fair complexions, a relic of the Danes’. It was
the Dutch who occupied the island for about twelve years in the
middle of the 18th century; if they did leave any descendants, the
intervening two centuries have obliterated all signs of them. They
were driven out of Kharak by Mir Mchenna, a Pirate Chief from
Bundar Rig, whom Niebuhr described in 1774, as ‘the most
execrable tyrant who ever existed, distinguished through this
country for his vices and cruelty*. He made his servants murder
his father in his presence, because the old man preferred his other
i
sons; he killed his mother because she reproached him for his
crimes, and he caused a brother and sixteen relations to be assassin­
ated in order to gain the throne. He had two of his sisters
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