'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎484] (543/714)

PERSIA
the Shah, these proposals are peculiarly seductive ; for, in any case
they mean the payment of a lump sum down to his own account; if
successful, they augment the annual revenue; and if the reverse
they only implicate foreigners in failure.
Whilst applauding the policy of assisting Persia by foreign
capital where she cannot assist herself, and in enterprises of un
questioned stability, I am of opinion that she is more likely to lose
than to gain from the indiscriminate gift of commercial concessions,
and that her best advisers should check any premature zeal in this
direction. The first concessionary usually thinks of little but selling
his monopoly, and realising a good profit for himself. He is not
uncommonly an adventurer, and sometimes a rogue. By the failure
of such bogus undertakings, good capital is frightened away from
the country, and the natives themselves form an unfavourable
impression of European conduct and honesty. The internal develop
ment of Persia will fare much better if it follows the broad lines of
road and railroad extension, rather than imperil its chances by
grotesque monopolies and fanciful concessions to vagrant chevaliers
d'industrie.
An unfortunate, but significant, illustration of the truth of the
above remarks, which appeared originally in the ' Times,' was
Recent
afforded by a case that occurred almost simultaneously
hdicmes w itli niy visit to Persia. One among the numerous con
cessions of the class that I have described had been granted by
the Shah—who had received his douceur —for the introduction, inter
alia, of State lotteries into Persia ; but this concession had subse
quently been cancelled in consequence of the inclusion of other and
less desirable items in its terms. In apparent ignorance of these
facts, the concession was disposed of to a syndicate, and again
passed on to a company (the Persian Investment Corporation),
whose final collapse agitated the London market in 1890; the
result of the entire series of transactions, the moral blame of which
I do not pretend to distribute, being that a great shock was given
to Persian credit and that capital was scared away from Persian
investment. Hence it arose that, when in the autumn of the same
year a large scheme was brought out for the formation of the
1 Imperial Tobacco Corporation of Persia,' to acquire and work a
concession for a monopoly of the purchase, sale, and manufacture of
the entire tobacco crop of the Persian Empire, this project, though
warmly commended by high authorities and possessing many