Feb. 9, 1857.] RAWLINSON ON SOUTHERN PERSIA. 297 



Bassadore was granted to us by the Imam of Muscat, to wliom the island of 

 Kishm belongs, at the period of our expedition against the pirates of the Gulf, 

 and it has answered our purpose quite sufficiently up to the present time. 

 It is possible, however, that in the course of the present operations the station 

 may be changed ; instead of Bassadore we may perhaps occupy the island of 

 Karak or some other more convenient station. Bassadore is our own soil at 

 present, but it is not a good position for a naval station. There is a great 

 deficiency of water, and the place is too distant from Bushir and Bussora to 

 be of any political weight. If we were able to exchange it for some other 

 place nearer at hand, it would certainly be to our advantage. 



With respect to Karak, I do not altogether agree with the observations con- 

 tained in General Monteith's paper. Although the island is sufficiently sup- 

 plied with water, and is moreover conveniently placed, it possesses the worst 

 anchorage perhaps throughout the Gulf. If it ever become, indeed, a place of 

 any importance, it will be so, not in consequeiice of its physical character, but 

 rather in spite of it. The whole island is a mass of coral rock, and it is only 

 one particular corner of it that is habitable. At this corner the rock is 

 covered with a small patch of soil, which suffices for a scanty cultivation; 

 here is erected the fort, around which are a few gardens, but there is no 

 harbour, nor even a roadstead. Vessels ordinarily anchor out on the southern 

 coast of the island, where they are sheltered from the prevailing north- westers, 

 but immediately the wind shifts and blows from the south-east they are on a 

 lee-shore ; so that they generally have to lie with springs on their cables, 

 prepared to slip immediately the wind shifts and run round the point for 

 shelter ; they lie again on the northern side of the point until a north-wester 

 comes, then they have to return to the anchorage S. of the island. That is 

 such a disadvantage for merchant vessels, that really I cannot contemplate the 

 possibility of an island so circumstanced ever becoming a great commercial 

 emporium. At present merchant vessels will never anchor off the island, 

 unless compelled to do so ; they used merely to pay short visits to the island 

 during our previous occupation, taking up their permanent anchorage in 

 Bushir roads. Owing to this great maritime defect I should be very sorry to see 

 any attempt made to turn Karak into a commercial emporium, like those which 

 previously existed in the Gulf, for I am confident such an attempt would fail. 

 If it had been a place where it was possible to establish an emporium, no doubt 

 it would have been selected for the purpose before this, as its geographical 

 position is excellent. At the same time, as it happens to be in the line 

 between Bushir and the mouth of the Euphrates, it may perhaps be of some 

 use as a telegraphic station, and as such we might retain it, but I cannot see 

 any other use for it. 



Other questions have been addressed to me with reference to a subject which 

 is almost too great to enter upon just at the close of the meeting. Still if the 

 meeting be desirous to hear a few words upon the geography of Herat, I shall 

 be quite prepared to offer them. I mentioned before that we have been twitted 

 with ignorance on that subject. It is sufficiently discouraging to geographers, 

 and especially to this Society, which has been established for the promotion 

 of geography, that the great leader of the English press — which may be con- 

 sidered as the exponent of the intelligence of the English nation— should pro- 

 fess an entire ignorance on the subject of Herat, not only ignorance of its 

 geography, but actually of the country to which it belongs. We were told 

 not long ago that its position was not known within a degree of longitude, 

 and that it was a doubtful point in political science whether it belonged to 

 Affghanistan or Persia. Now I hardly think that is a fair statement of the 

 case, and I am glad to see that such ignorance, either real or affected, has not 

 been endorsed, generally, by the public feeling of England. If you cast your 

 eyes on Mr. Walker's map of the N.W. frontiers of India, suspended on the 



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