THE BU SAIDI ARABS. 



289 



Sayf el Asdi. After crushing sundry rebellions, 

 he plundered Diu (a.d. 1760), and massacred the 

 population, a disaster from which the great port 

 and fort never recovered. He then sent an 

 army of 12,000 men against the Ghafiri of Ea'as 

 el Khavmah, who had assisted the Persians to 

 attack the Kawasim, and against the Nuaymi, a 

 powerful clan dwelling south of Sharjah on the 

 Pirate Coast. His success was complete ; Khur- 

 fakan, Khasab, Eamsah, Ea'as el Khaymah, 

 Jezirat el Hamrah, Sharjah, and Fasht, all in 

 turn submitted to him. In a.d. 1785 he per- 

 sonally visited Mombasah, and by his lion-like 

 demeanour he secured its submission. 



Dying shortly afterwards, Ahmad bin Said 

 left the government to his son, Said bin Ahmad, 

 who was declared Imam, but was confined till 

 the date of his death, in 1802, to Eustak and its 

 territory by his younger brother, the ambitious 

 and warlike Sultan bin Ahmad. This prince 

 occupied the islands of Khishm, Hormuz, and 

 Bahrayn ; he attempted to protect his commerce 

 from the pirates of Julfar and Ea'as el Khaymah, 

 especially the Kawasim, in our books called 

 Jowasmee: 1 these Algerines of the East had now 



1 The Western as well as the Eastern Arabs turn the hard 

 Kaf into a Jim, e. g. Jibleh for Kibleh. The Kawasim derive 

 vol. l 19 



