‘Koweit [Kuwait]. A report compiled in the Intelligence Branch, Quarter Master General’s Department’ [‎5] (19/66)

5
made of a fleet from Koweit, appearing at Bahrein (in 1782-83)
in support of their old confederates, the A1 Khalifeh, against the
Persians.
It is difficult to trace the varying policy of the different
tribes, during a period so unsettled as was the end of the 18th
and beginning of the 19th Century, when almost every tribe's
hand was against his neighbour. While the A1 Uttubis of the
Bahrein neighbourhood are constantly in evidence, in the
Government Records, in connection with the Persians, Muscat,
the Wahabis, Joasmis, and the piracy question generally, Koweit
seems to have pursued the even tenor of its way, and the Al-
Subah tribe to have continued to prosper and to increase their
power and possessions.
In 1813-14, Koweit and Bahrein were the only exceptions
to the general subjection of the whole of the Arabian coast to
the Wahabi Amir, Saood.
A barren shore with brackish water,* backgrounded by
desert, inhabited only by wandering Bedouin tribes, was hardly
a promising site, and a settlement thus made by ex-pirates was
scarcely a more promising beginning, and yet on this spot there
has sprung up a clean well-built and active town, to which
Persian and Arab merchants have been attracted by equity of
rule and freedom of trade.
The present Sheikh, Mubarak, is the sixth of his line, and
is now about 59 years of age. A fine tall, dignified man, almost
a typical Patriarch, good-looking too, in spite of being marked
by small-pox ; while his keen black eyes show marked intelli
gence, as well as a considerable amount of astuteness.
The fourth Sheikh, Subah by name, had five sons,—Muham
mad, Jarrah, Mubarak, Ahmad, and Jabr. On his father's death,
the eldest son, Muhammad, succeeded to the Sheikh-dom." He
seems, however, to have been on bad terms with all his brothers,
with the exception of Jarrah, who was a son of the same mother.
At all events, Mubarak and Jabr conspired against the two^ elder
brothers and—a not altogether uncommon occurrence in the
family history of Arab tribes—assassinated them in May 1896,
and Mubarak reigned in his eldest brother's stead.
The latter had two sonst who fled and placed themselves
under the protection of Mohammed -Ibn-Rashid, who bad wrested
Nejd from the descendants of the Wahabi chief, Feysul-bin-
Turki.
Such frequent mention will have to be made of Ibn Rashid
whose position and influence is so closely connected and, in a
sense, derived from the Wahabi power of Nejd, that it is neces-
• The town now diaws its supply of drinking water from wells, two miles
inland.
f Khalid-ibn-Mohammed and Saood-ibn-Mohammed.