"دليل الخليج. مجلد I. القسم التاريخي. الجزء II. ج. ج. لوريمر. ١٩١٥" [‎٢‎٤‎٦‎٤] (١٢٦٢/٩٨١)

2464
who had been accustomed to make use of the Indian Post Office for the
transmission of valuables and letters of importance. On the 29th of
August 1883 the Wali of Baghdad complained of the refusal of the
Indian post office at Basrah to accept from the Turkish Post Office
letters for India and other foreign countries unless stamped with
Indian stamps. On the 11th of September 1888 the contest was
renewed at Constantinople by a futile demand on the part of the Ottoman
Government " for suppression of the service with regard to the transport
of letters and correspondence between Basrah and Baghdad by Messrs.
Lynch & Co/s steamers. 33 A partial concession was made to Turkish
objections by the discontinuance of house-to-house distribution of letters
from the Indian post offices at Baghdad and Basrah and by the substi
tution of a window delivery; but the carriage of letters of Turkish
subjects from Baghdad and Basrah to various river-bank places on the
Tigris continued until February 1886^ after which it ceased and such
letters^ when received by the British, were transferred to the Turkish
Post Office.
1884, In 1884 the Porte returned to the charge with a Memorandum drawn
up by their Director General of Posts and Telegraphs; this manifesto
laid stress on the equality of the postal position of Turkey with that of
the other nations which had joined the Postal Union; proclaimed the
ability of the Turkish Post Office to cope with the entire mail arrange
ments of Turkish •'Iraq; demanded the cessation of the British desert post;
and asserted a liability on the part of the Euphrates and Tigris Company^
steamers to carry the Turkish mails free of charge between Baghdad and
Basrah. The last contention, though a paragraph of the Paris Conven- t.
tion was quoted in its support, was ill-founded; and the Ottoman demands
were rejected in their entirety on the broad ground that they would
entail a loss of facility in postal communication between India and
Turkish ■'Iraq. Also in 1884, a system of searching passengers who
disembarked from British steamers on the Tigris for letters not bearing
Turkish stamps was introduced, but it was soon discontinued in conse
quence of diplomatic representations made at Constantinople.
1885-87. In 1885 and 1887 fresh efforts were made by the Turkish Govern
ment to obtain the abolition of the Indian post offices at Baghdad and
Basrah, but, like those which had preceded them, they were abortive.
1893-1901. From 1893 onwards local letters posted at Baghdad for Basrah and j,
vice versa were transferred to the Turkish post office for disposal; j
formerly a quantity of correspondence between those and intermediate
places had been carried free, in an irregular manner, by the steamers of ^
the Euphrates and Tigris Steam Navigation Company. A scheme E
of procedure suggested by the Turkish Post Office in 1894, which
would have resulted in the virtual closure of the British Office at |
Baghdad, was successfully thwarted. a Ship^s letters'", i .e., letters |
containing bills of lading, etc., or relating to cargo on board, continued i
to be carried unstamped by the Company's vessels until 1901, when j|
portable letter-boxes were provided on board by the Ottoman Post
Office for the reception of such covers; no use however was made of ^
the boxes, and after some months they were withdrawn. In 1901, m
consequence of a difficulty made by the Turkish post office at Jiddah
fkt
In 1882
^plaints \