'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎10] (17/714)

X
PlvRSIA
ar e few places of importance in Persia which are not either de
scribed or referred to in these volumes, whose index may to some
extent answer the purpose of a condensed Gazetteer. Finally, 1
hope that the Map, which has cost me a year's anxious labour and
supervision, may be regarded as a decisive advance upon any
previous publication. Its original execution by the skilful hand
of Mr. W. J. Turner, and its appearance here, 1 owe to the liberal-
minded generosity of the Royal Geographical Society, who under
took and placed in my hands the responsibility for its production.
For notes as to the authorities from which it has been compiled,
and the principles which have been observed in its construction, 1
will refer to the memorandum which .1 wrote to accompany its first
appearance in the Proceedings of the Society for February 1892.
Here I will only say that there is barely a name on its surface the
identification and the spelling of which I have not personally
supervised. It doubtless contains many errors ; but these, 1 would
fain hope, are the result, not of carelessness, but ot data as yet in
many parts imperfect. The smaller maps have been specially
drawn for this work, under my instructions, by Mr, Sharbau,
Cartographer to the Royal Geographical Society, whose elegant
and accurate workmanship none can fail to admire.
If, in the handling of these, or, still more, of the political and
general branches of my subject, about which I shall have some
thing to say in an introductory chapter, my readers, comparing this
book with similar ones on Western countries, find conspicuous
defects of treatment or information, may I beg of them to re
member that in the East there are no official sources of knowledge
accessible to the public, no blue books, no statistics scientifically
compiled, no census, no newspapers, no periodicals—none of that
magnificent paraphernalia of which it is still doubtful whether it
adds to the sum of human happiness or is the parent of intellectual
confusion. Figures and facts—which are, in their very essence, an
insult to the Oriental imagination—are only arrived at in Persia
after long and patient inquiry and by careful collation of the
results of a great number of independent investigations ; and I