'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎610] (701/748)

610
PERSIA
where it joined the marine cable to Kurrachi. It was not laid
without much difficulty, and many exasperating impediments,
arising from the obstinacy of local governors, and the depredations
of nomad tribes. These and all other obstacles were, however,
overcome by the unwearying patience of the officers employed, and
so rapidly did the opposition of the Persians subside, that an agree
ment having been concluded in 1864, which allowed for manage
ment of the line by British officers for five months, at the end
of which period they were to leave the country, a second Convention
was signed in November 1865, which provided for a second wire
to be used exclusively for European messages, and extended the
period of residence for the English employes, whose maximum
number was fixed at fifty, to five years. These consecutive modi
fications of the original terms were so many tributes to the tactful
behaviour of the foreigners, and to the impossibility of working the
line without their assistance. As a matter of fact, the Persians
were not less the gainers by this second Convention than the
English; for they secured thereby a free wire for local use, a
maximum royalty of 30,000 tomans 10,000 Persian dinars, or a gold coin of that value. , or 12,000Z., for the right of
transit enjoyed by the foreigners, and the ultimate reversion of the
entire property. The Shah's advisers would have been ill-advised
themselves had they thwarted so excellent a bargain.
The next step in chronological order was the opening of a third
Perso-European line in 1866, by the junction of the Russian and
8 Russian Persian wires on the Caucasian frontier. By none of
line these three systems, however, viz. the Anglo-Turkish,
the Anglo-Persian, or the Russo-Persian, were good results
Obtained. The staff in no case was competeut, transmission was
very slow, there was hopeless confusion of dates arising from the
different calendars recognised, and the mutilation of messages
consequent upon the frequent translations and retranslations by
ignorant clerks into English, Erench, Dutch, German, Italian, Greek,
Bulgarian, Wallachian, Servian, Russian, Turkish and Armenian,
reduced the patrons of the various lines to a state bordering upon
frenzy.
A way out of the difficulty was suggested by a private firm.
Messrs. Siemens Brothers, in 1867, conceived the idea of a special
double line from London to Teheran, to be constructed by a European
company and to be used exclusively for Indian messages. Their
peculiar and influential relations with the various Governments con-