'General information on Persia for any future edition, 1895' [‎75r] (140/211)

53
Last autumn (November 1890) 6,300 Circassians, destined for Koniah, arrived at
Selefki and Mersina, but the Koniah authorities having declined to receive them, they
were ordered to be landed at the Adana ports, and waste lands to be allotted to them
in the vilayet. Cholera breaking out shortly after their arrival, they were dispersed
throughout the villages and towns, hutted in a miserable manner, and receiving only
bread rations from the Government.
They came from the country about Anapa, are robust and healthy-looking peasants,
all with large families, well clad, and fairly supplied with cash in Russian paper
roubles. When I was at Adana early in March they were still there, doing nothing,
awaiting allotments of lands, and looking very miserable and disheartened, the accounts
they had received of their fellow-countrymen who had preceded them having already
prepared them for the life in store for them.
They complained much of the manner in which they had been deceived, and of
the fair promises held out to them to desert their native land by their Imaums and
others. Tear of Russian military service seemed to have been the chief cause of their
quitting their country.
. Some of the better-to-do Chiefs had already left Adana for other parts of Turkey.
Tbeir conduct was most exemplary, and I could not discover a complaint against them
on any score. They were armed, not with rifles or guns, but with the traditional long
dagger and pistol, which form part of their national costume, even little boys of 10 or
12 years having such appendages. They are now leaving Adana (March i.6) for tho
Sandjaks of Kozan and Jebel Bereket, where waste and fertile lands have been chosen
for them in the plains of those districts, viz., Osmanie, Cis, &c., the mountainous
districts of these regions not permitting settlement, not possessing sufficient cultivable
land even for the natives.
No fears appear to be entertained of them by the Armenian and other Christians
there, the former living chiefly in the mountains, being perfetly well able, I was told,
to take care of themselves in case of necessity, and being, I was assured, all armed.
As regards the Circassian Colonies already established at Yerswat and elsewhere in
the Cilician plains, I could hear of no complaint save of a little cattle and horse stealing
on rare occasions, and during the two years, since when tobacco-planting has begun,
some smuggling.
Regarding these new arrivals they were regarded by the people with pity, and as
surely to fall victims to the climate as their predecessors.
Revenue .—The revenue of the vilayet varies between 200,000/. and 300,000/.,
varying according to the success or otherwise of the harvests. No havales are drawn
by Constantinople on the province.
Salaries of public functionaries and servants are regularly paid. The revenues
are burdened with the annual payment of 70,000/. on account of the Russian War
indemnity, payable out of tithes, leaving last year an excess of 18,000/. to the credit
of the Imperial exchequer.
The revenue of the past year was as follows:—
Name of Sandjak.
Land Tax.
Military
Exemption
Tax.
Tithes.
Sheep
and Goat
Tax.
Judicial
Fees.
Miscella
neous.
Forests.
Adana . 4
£
£
£
£
£
£
£
• • • •
17,449
1,281
66,021
13,764
1,422
62
2;015
Mersina
8,714
490
22,447
5,880
660
Itchyel ..
• • • •
10,512
. 179
15,662
19,194
307
1,237
Kozan ,.
• • • •
7,228
2,125
9,061
7.473
147
13
Jebel Bereket ..
..
5,532
848
8,580
9,201
434
139
442
Totals
..
••
49,435
4,923
121,771
55,512
~V~
2,970
201
3,707
—J
247^619
The customs revenue vary between 16,000/. and 20,000/., the bulk of the imports
having already paid duty at other Turkish ports.
General Remarks .—The difference between the two provinces of Aleppo and Adana
are striking, and it is difficult to believe that they are in the same Empire, and so
near.
In the former we have large, fertile, and comparatively healthy tracts of country,
practically uninhabited and devoid of roads. The sparse agricultural population,
composed exclusively of Mahommedans of various and antagonistic sects, indolent,
ignorant, and apathetic, cultivating unprofitably far too much land for their means,