44 
RESIDENCE OF THE MISSION AT BUSHIRE. 
Loane, who was taken prisoner by them. It is unnecessary, therefore, 
to add more on the subject than that their chief resort is at Roselkeim , 
on the Arabian coast of the Gulph of Persia: another, but tributary, 
chief of the same people resides twenty-five miles from Roselkeim at 
Egmaitn , S. S. W. of Cape Musseldom , where they possess an extensive 
and lucrative pearl fishery. This, with the market which their 
plunder finds there, is the principal source of the traffic of the place. 
Though it may not be necessary to enter into a detail, which may be 
better found in original authorities, it must be very obvious, that the 
honour of our flag, as well as the interest of our commerce in the East, 
will require the destruction of a fleet of pirates, which, assembling to 
the amount of fifty sail in the harbour of Roselkeim , issue thence to 
capture every English as well as native ship, and to spread terror 
through the Gulph of Persia 
On the arrival of the Nautilus , under these circumstances, the Envoy 
dispatched a letter to Captain Davis of the Sapphire , requesting him 
to proceed to the entrance ot the Gulph, to secure the Sylph , if possible. 
On the 6th Nov. a boat arrived from Roselkeim , at the date of the de¬ 
parture of which no such capture had been made; but in three days, 
another boat came in, which brought an account that four vessels had 
been taken, one of which contained a Nawah. We immediately recog¬ 
nized by this description the unfortunate Persian Secretary, the splen¬ 
dour of whose dress had imposed him as a Nabob on the pirates. The 
next day a still more circumstantial account of the capture reached us, 
which convinced us that the vessel taken was the Sylph; but the report 
added, that a large vessel from Bushire (which we instantly identified 
with the Nereide) came in sight during the action, and having sunk one 
bf the pirates, (of whose crew of three hundred scarcely any escaped), 
retook their prize. In the action too, the pirates lost one of their fust 
chiefs, Sal ben Sal. The loss of one individual, the most insigni- 
* See the note on their destruction, at the end. 
