'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎202] (237/714)

PERSIA
Kuchan, Kelat, Sarakhs, Khaf, and Seistan are the several scenes
of operation, and may eventually supply the requisite doorways of
entry. A glance at the map and at the Transcaspian position of
Kussia, coterminous for 300 miles with the northern border of
Khorasan, will show how a situation which the vicinity of a strong
Power in possession of the mountains might have rendered ex
tremely critical has, in the face of a neighbour as weak and pliant
as Persia, been converted by Russia into an overwhelming ad
vantage.
It is scarcely possible indeed to exaggerate the effect which the
Transcaspian conquests of Russia, and her subsequent construction
Influence a ra ^ wa y across the desert immediately outside and
of the below the Persian frontier, have had upon the political
Caspian condition, and will have upon the political destinies of her
neighbours. This, however, is a wider question than
should fall within the scope of a chapter dealing solely with one
province of the Persian dominion ; and I therefore propose to defer
it till a chapter is reached which shall handle the whole question
of Russian influence and policy in Persia, of which General
Annenkoff's railway may be described as one of the propelling
instruments. 1
Before I leave the politics of Khorasan, let me revert once again
Interior f 0 its administrative subdivisions, and supplement the
districts information which I have given about the border
provinces by a brief sketch of its interior districts. I may divide
these into two classes : an inner row, or second line, so to speak,
of border districts; and districts which have no connection with
the frontier at all.
Commencing from the south, where we left off with Seistan, and
striking inland from about the same parallel as Kain, we come to
the province of Tabbas, which touches on the south that
of Yezd, from which it is 200 miles distant. The in
habitants of Tabbas are partly Arabs, partly Persians, and are
ruled by a hereditary chieftain of analogous though inferior position
to the Khans y Ilkhanis, and Amirs previously described. His name
is Mirza Mohammed Bakar Khan, and his official title the Imad-el-
Mulk, or ' Pillar of the State '; though it cannot be contended that
either in contributions or in individual importance he lends to it any
particular support. The country is big and poor, the people m-
1 Vide vol. ii. cap. xxx.
Tabbas