مجموعة ٦/ ١٩ "الجزيرة العربية: (المملكة العربية السعودية) التقرير السنوي لمملكة الحجاز ونجد." [و‎‎١‎٦‎٧] (٥٤٠/٣٣٤)

31
object was probably connected with the oil potentialities of the Koweit Neutral
Zone. This subject has been dealt with in paragraph 68 above. All that need
be added here is that, although Major Holmes had got some sort of invitation
from the Saudi Government, he left with unexpected rapidity. Since then there
has been much reason to believe that Ibn Saud, who has had a grievance against
Major Holmes for years, is still hostile to him and that the Standard Oil Company
of California have no use for him either.
130. In June Ibn Saud sounded His Majesty’s Government in the United
Kingdom as to whether any British group would be interested in an oil concession
in Asir and the Farsan Islands, regarding which he had been approached by
Italian interests. This led to conversations between Fuad Bey Hamza and a
representative of the Iraq Petroleum Company when the former was in Palestine,
but the matter was shelved eventually. Even less was heard of potential oil
enterprise in the North-Western Hejaz, a subject which, however, interests
various people. The Standard Oil Company of California may have their eye
on that area, and it certainly interests Mr. Ydlibi, of Manchester, who was
mentioned in paragraph 128 (c) of the report for 1932. Towards the end of
1933 this gentleman struck up an alliance with the Eastern and General Syndicate,
the outcome of which was the creation of the Arabian Development Syndicate
(Limited). The activities of this concern did not, however, become apparent
until 1934.
131. The American engineer, Mr. Twitchell, floated on and off the Arabian
stage at intervals during 1933. He was connected in some way with the
negotiations of the Standard Oil Company of California, but not as their
principal representative. He made no apparent progress with his schemes for
gold mining.
132. At the beginning of 1933 it looked as though the project for a railway
between Jedda and Mecca (see paragraph 128 (d) of the report for 1932) was
falling through. In February 1933, however, Dr. S. 0. K. Jeelani obtained a
concession on terms very favourable to the Government. He went off to India
to get the backing, which he had apparently not previously secured. Up to the
end of the year he seemed to be having very little success, and the railway project,
though not dead, remained in abeyance. It seemed likely to prove economically
unsound, but may still enlist enough religious support for the railway to be built
eventually.
133. The Hyderabad! promoters of the scheme of creating a textile industry
in the Hejaz, which was mentioned in paragraph 128 (a) of the report for 1932,
made some practical progress on a small scale in 1933. A certain amount of
money was collected in India, and a certain amount of material was imported
into the Hejaz. This, however, must still be regarded rather as a charitable
effort to give employment in a moderate scale in the Hejaz than as a serious
contribution to its economic development.
134. The question of supplying Jedda with water from Waziriyya, some
10 miles outside the town, excited renewed interest during the year. Mention
was made in the report for 1931, paragraph 148, of the erection of a windmill
to raise well-water at this spot, under Mr. Twitchell’s auspices, and the efforts
made to recondition the old Turkish conduit connecting it with the town.
Mr. TwitchelTs installation was not very successful, and in 1933 his method
was superseded by that of digging water-galleries, as it were, to collect and
canalise the water which abounds in the sub-soil. This system was brought
into operation by persons familiar with the arrangements for supplying Mecca.
By the end of the year Waziriyya water was actually flowing into a distributing
centre in Jedda, although the method of collecting the water had hardly passed
out of the experimental stage and the state of the conduit still left much to be
desired.
135. Various other schemes were spoken of in one connexion or another
during the year. Most of these were no more than the airy visions of would-be
concessionnaries, but an Indian firm, Messrs. Ibrahim Jewan Baksh, of Calcutta,
made more definite proposals to the Saudi Government for providing a public
supply of electricity in Mecca.