'Travels in Assyria, Media, and Persia, including a journey from Bagdad by Mount Zagros, to Hamadan, the ancient Ecbatana, researches in Ispahan and the ruins of Persepolis, and journey from thence by Shiraz and Shapoor to the sea-shore. Description of Bussorah, Bushire, Bahrein, Ormuz, and Muscat, narrative of an expedition against the pirates of the Persian Gulf, with illustrations of the voyage of Nearchus, and passage by the Arabian Sea to Bombay.' [‎350] (381/582)

350
BUSHIRE,
unintelligible; and short as is the distance, and constant as is the
communication between these places, I scarcely ever remarked a
greater difference than there is between their different pronun
ciations of the same words ; the one is a model of the most har
monious utterance; the other is nearly as harsh as the most ill-
spoken Arabic. This last language is understood by most of the
natives of Bushire ; but they have as little elegance in their way
of pronouncing this, as they have in speaking their own tongue;
and one must hear the Arabic of Bushire, to comprehend how harsh
and disagreeable its sounds are capable of being made. This double
corruption is the more striking, as they live close to, and in con
stant communication with Shiraz, where Persian is spoken in its
greatest purity ; and they both trade with and receive frequent
visitors from Coete, or Graen, on the opposite coast, where the
Arabic is spoken with all the softness and harmony of which it is
susceptible, and in a way superior to that of any other part of
Arabia in which I had heard it.
The merchants of Bushire are composed about equally of Per
sians and Armenians. The latter, however, are men of more
extensive connexions with India; and as they possess more acti
vity, intelligence, and integrity of dealing, so they are more
wealthy; and this, with the countenance which they receive from
the Company's Resident here, is sufficient to give them consider
able influence in the place. There are no Jews of any note, as at
Bussorah; nor Banians, as at Muscat;—the Armenians supplying
the place of both, as brokers and agents for others, as well as
traders on their own account; and as these both write and speak
English and Hindostanee, they are more generally useful to mari
time men, and mercantile visitors from India.
The Governor of the town. Sheik Abd-el-Russool, is of a family
long resident here, and he exercises all the responsible functions
of the government, though he has an uncle. Sheik Mohammed, in
whose presence he himself stands, and to whom he always yields
the greatest honours. Both of these, when they walk out, are