'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎606] (673/714)

606
PERSIA
already some jealousy between them, the pay, uniform, &c.. which
are part of the endowment of the king's college, acting as an
attraction which the Naib's college cannot equal. What the
type of officer may be that the latter will ultimately produce
remains to be seen. The cadets that I saw were very young-
boys.
While I am upon the subject of military reforms, I may mention
two other schemes whose inauguration followed the first European
Military journey of the Shah, and was itself speedily followed by
hospiiai their collapse. One of these was a Staff College, under
a Danish officer. The other was a military hospital with twenty
beds. An annual endowment was granted by the Shah and
regularly disappeared into the pockets of the hospital superinten
dent; and no provision appears to have been made for staff,
medicine, or treatment. One day the Shah announced his inten
tion of visiting the hospital, which, as usual, was empty. The
superintendent was equal to the emergency. Twentv soldiers were
hurriedly brought in from the barrack or bazaars, placed under the
coverlets and instructed to groan when the sovereign walked in
Nor could anyone complain, seeing that the experiment was equally
agreeable to all parties.
The average stamp of Persian officer being what I have described
it is not to be wondered at that his quality reacts with disastrous
The rank force upon and is reproduced in exaggerated proportions
an e among the men. During the half-century since the Persian
seriaz has ceased to be put through his exercises by British drill
sergeants, and m the absence of any equivalent tuition, and the
chronic stint of equipment, rations, and pay, he has sunk to a very
low position m the scale of efficiency, courage, and fighting power.
Military service is distasteful to him from the start He is rarely if
ever, a volunteer. Ill-fed, ill-clad, and unpaid, in the intervals'of
service, and often while actually with the colours, he ekes out a scanty
subsistence by plying the trade of a butcher, or porter, or money
changer, or common labourer in the bazaars; from which employ
ment he emerges on parade days, struggles into a uniform supplied
from the depot, and, his perfunctory duty fulfilled, returns to his
civil avocation. Even the men in uniform and actually embodied
are usually to be seen slouching about the bazaars anyhow, and doing
nothing. It is perhaps in respect of his pay that he is most to be
pitied; for the money leaves the State chest in the first place and