'Selections from the Records of the Bombay Government' [‎39] (76/733)

CONCLUDING REMARKS. 39
find hardy mariners, which they have since turned to purposes so
different from these civilized habits, the primary cause of their
aggrandisement.
From this the British were among the first sufferers, by the attack
on one of their smallest cruisers, assailed in the roads of Bushire with
ammunition which had, in an hour of friendly communication previous
to the attack, been solicited and bestowed on the chief of the assailing
fleet. These hollow friends were, however, beaten off, with consider
able loss on their side.
To proceed, then, on a plan of methodical and comprehensive detail,
it were perhaps advisable, in order to prove their addiction to com
mercial pursuits, to premise an account of these tribes in the days of
their upright and honorable exertion, previous to their conversion to the
Wahabee faith, which paved the way to every subsequent atrocity.
These, and other particulars given in the course of this Report, relating
to the Arabs of the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. , are the results of personal investiga
tion, or of cautious gleanings from Natives of authority, and capable of
close observation. ^ , +
They were originally employed, as these authorities state,
commercial enterprise, in the cultivation of extensive groves of the date
tree, and the pursuit of a lucrative pearl fishery. The sale of the yearly
produce of their date grounds placed the proprietors in possession of an
equivalent amounting to Bs. 80,000, of which the governing power
received a tenth, or Rs. 8,000. Their fleets consisted of large boats, as
the Dow A term adopted by British officials to refer to local sailing vessels in the western Indian Ocean. and Buggalow Large trading vessel. , and smaller ones,^ or the Buteel and Bugare .
The former visited the ports of India, \emen, Africa, ^ in , u c ^
Muskat, and Bussora, and in each of these different TO y a gf the ,al ^ 0t
a sinefe share of a seaman was as follows : in the voyage to India from
Ks 50 to Rs. 60 ; to Yemen, Rs. 80 ; to Africa, Rs. 40 ; to Sind and
Kntch, from Rs. 25 to Rs. 30; to Muskat Rs. ^
to Bussora they gained nothing, bat ^ a ^ ,
dates for the different ports above men tone^ J ^ to each
generally to Bahre^and Kateei; whtch ^a s^ ^ load
sailor of from an d its adjacent tributaries, which paid
with grain for Ras -ool-Khyma and its ^ ^ ^
1 r r r,ts i-zs "
large vessels was sixty, and of the lesset on - s extent, and the
Their pearl banks, mi,es off shore,
— b - s of different
a
in six