Settlement and Demarcation of the Frontier between Persia and Baluchistan [‎411r] (57/74)

2nd. As irrigation for the date groves, fields, &c. 5 is obtained partly by water-
trenches and partly by “ kanats” (subterranean canalsl, the question of
irrigation would prove a constant and fruitful cause of dispute. Rights
of pasturage, which at present are enjoyed by people of the valley indis
criminately, would be destroyed probably greatly to the injury of the
inhabitants of the right bank, as most of the grazing lands are on the
high hills to the north of the valley.
Zrd. The area of land included in this scheme is 1,950 square miles, and con
tains many villages. Practically, should the right bank of the Kedj
valley become Persian to the junction of the Niheng with the Kil River,
the frontier will follow the ridge of the mountains on the left bank
up to the point of junction. Were these rivers large and wide like the
Shat-al-Arab, the condition, as a frontier line, would be altered. Above
Mund the Niheng pursues its course through a mountainous and barren
district, so that the possession of land on the one bank does not interfere
with the rights of communities on the other. The Askan River run
ning into the Maskkid River, though inhabited on both sides, is separated
by the desert tracts of Ghur and Segundum from inhabited Khelat
territory. The difference between the two schemes is this: one frontier
runs from hill to hill through a barren uninhabited desert waste, with
* no interests or vested rights to disturb, and on which accidental tres
pass of the frontier would be impossible ; the other through a popu
lated district, whose inhabitants, possessing lands and interests on
either side of the frontier, would, as has been shewn, suffer from a
plurality of rulers.
(Signed) B. LOVETT, Captain B. K,
Attached to special mission.
(Signed) F. J. GOLDSMID, Major-General.
On special mission.
No. 164, dated Gulahek, the 16th August 1871.
Prom— Major-General F. J. Goldsmid, c. b , on special mission.
To—Her Britannic Majesty's Minister at Teheran.
I HAVE the honor to report briefly the result of the interview which I held
yesterday with Mirza Maasum Khan.
The Persian Commissioner was with me about 5 p. m. He was accompanied
by his brother, whom he wished to introduce. Presuming that he was correct m
stating that the latter did not know French, we conversed in that language as
though without a third party, until joined by Captain Smith. That officer, how
ever, was not long in appealing.
I was desirous of carrying out Your Excellency’s suggestion that a written
record should be made of our discussion, and called in Mirza Hassun (who had
accompanied our mission) as amanuensis. But, although a preliminary question
which I put on the nature of the Persian claims to territory in possession of the
Khelat State was registered, and, although a show of protocollmg was made on
Mirza Maasum Khan’s part by the display of blank paper in his brother s vest,
we proceeded no further. The arguments to which I have for some time been
? "tY h " 7rb.2tri.£“ f « .ft Jt.
« g“Thl £“2,.. J ti-t, .iUing . 1 « •» “1