'SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS AND MEASURES OF THE VICEROYALTY OF HIS EXCELLENCY LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON, VICEROY AND GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF INDIA IN THE FOREIGN DEPARTMENT. I. JANUARY 1899-APRIL 1904. II. DECEMBER 1904-NOVEMBER 1905. VOLUME IV. PERSIA AND THE PERSIAN GULF.' [‎144r] (292/386)

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17. The question had been raised whether I should make an attempt to see
the Sheikh of Mohammerah. As, however, I did not propose to ascend the
S hat-el-Arab, as an invitation to the Sheikh to meet me elsewhere than in his
own territory might, in view of his peculiar and rather delicate relations with
the Persian Government, have given otfence to the latter, and as Sir A. Hardinge
himself intended to visit him a little later, it seemed to me that the idea had
better not he pursued. The Sheikh sent me a very courteous letter by the
hand of Major Burton, our Vice-Consul at Ahwaz, and to this I replied iu a
similar tone.
18. At Bushire my tour of the Gulf was really at an end; the squadron
dispersed : and, touching, only at Jask for telegraphic messages on my return
journey, the “ Hardinge ” carried me back into Indian waters. On the way
I halted for a day at Pasni, a small port, with a possible future before it, on the
coast of British Makran.
The opportunity was taken to hold a Darbir for the Chiefs and Sardars
of Western and Southern Baluchistan. Colonel Yate had corne for the purpose
from Quetta, and the Sardars attended in force from as far as Las Bela on the
east, Kharan on the north, and the Persian border on the west, having in some
cases been marching for weeks in order to be present. No Governor-General
had ever previously visited Malsran. It is a part of the Indian Empire, which
has been somewhat neglected, hut which, as soon as peace has been thoroughly-
established on the Persian frontier, will acquire some importance and admit
of a not inconsiderable expansion. The speech which I made at the Darbar A public or private audience held by a high-ranking British colonial representative (e.g. Viceroy, Governor-General, or member of the British royal family). will
be found among the enclosures.
19. On 7th December I arrived again at Karachi, after an absence of
exactly three weeks. The programme had been carried out, with one excep
tion, in every particular: and the utmost good fortune had attended us
throughout. The weather ha 1 been extraordinarily favourable: and all the
officers concerned bad laboured hard to make the proceedings a success. It \
cannot, I think, be doubted that they will have left upon the rulers and peoples
of the Gulf a powerful and lasting impression of the incontestable predomin
ance of British interests in those regions, and of the resolute intention of the [
British and Indian Governments to maintain them.
Enclosure I to 15.
Reply of Eis Excellency the Viceroy to an Address of JVelcome presented to
him at 3Iaskat on the 18th November 1903 by a deputation of Hindu,
Muhammadan, Farsi, and other protected British subjects settled in the
towns of Maskat and Matra.
Gentlemen, —It is with much pleasure that I have received the loyal and
well-composed address which has just been read, and that, on crossing the sea
from India to the shores of another country, I find a large and prosperous
community of the subjects of His Majesty the King-Emperor existing and
plying their trade here in conditions of security and contentment. I have made
some attempt to ascertain the numbers of British Indian subjects who are thus
to be found in Maskat and the other ports of Oman, and I find that they amount
to no fewer than 1,300 persons, the majority of whom came originally, or come
now, from the opposite shores of Sind and Kathiawar. The fact that these two
coasts face each other at so inconsiderable a distance, and the well-known
aptitudes of the particular communities that you represent, sufficiently explain
the close mercantile connections that have grown up during the last century
between Maskat and India, and leave one in no surprise at the commercial
predominance of Great Britain in the trade and shipping of this State.
Gentlemen, the political stake of one country in another is sometimes
measured by its commercial interests, but does not always lend itself readily to
precise or mathematical definition. On the other hand, the commercial stake is
more easily reduced to figures and calculations the effect of which is not ope n