56 
RESIDENCE OF THE MISSION AT BUSHIRE. 
fishing. The connexion is so well ascertained, (at least so fully cre¬ 
dited, not by them only, but by the merchants,) that the prices paid 
to the fishermen are, in fact, always raised, when there have been 
great rains. 
II. Bushire (or more properly Abuschahr, for the former is but the 
corruption of an English sailor) is now the principal Port of Persia. It 
stands in lat. 28°. 59- in long. 50°. 43. E. of Greenwich. It is situated 
on the extremity of a peninsula, which is formed by the sea on one side, 
and on the other by an inlet terminating in extensive swamps. At the 
narrowest part of this neck of land the seas, in the equinoctial spring 
tides, have sometimes met and rendered it an island; but this has hap¬ 
pened once only during the ten years which preceded our visit, and the 
effect then continued but two or three days; and so visible is the present 
encroachment of the land upon the inlet, that the recurrence of such an 
overflow will soon be entirely impossible. Every appearance, indeed, 
proves, that the whole of the peninsula has been thus gained from the 
sea. The extreme flatness of the general surface, the soil itself, the 
water, and the relative position of the whole peninsula to the moun¬ 
tains which rise abruptly from its inland extremities, suggest the suppo¬ 
sition of such an accumulation. 
On the southern bank of the inlet is a long range of rocks, which, 
though now two or three miles distant, may at one time have been 
washed by the sea. In digging for water, the people of the peninsula 
have sunk wells to the depth of thirty fathoms; and before they could 
reach the spring they have been obliged to perforate three layers of a 
soft stone composed of sand and shells. Generally of the whole soil, 
sand is the principal ingredient. 
The town itself of Bushire occupies the very point of the peninsula, 
and forms a triangle, of which the base on the land side is alone forti¬ 
fied. At unequal distances along the walls, there are twelve towers, 
two of which form the town-gate; they are all chequered at the top by 
holes, through which the inhabitants may point their musketry, and 
those at the gates have a variety of such contrivances. There is at the 
