'Turkish Arabia: Being an Account of an Official Tour in Babylonia, Assyria, and Mesopotamia, 1886-87' [‎15r] (29/72)

i5
sanitation. The Governor was fresh from Constantinople, and too exhausted by his journey
either to pay or receive a visit. From the appearance of his two sons, and from what
they said when calling with his apologies, evidently the whole party was as much out
of its element in Kirkuk as a Bengali would be if "posted'' to Kandahar.
The work of coping with the Hamawands had been temporarily entrusted to one of
Special military operations. most rising officers perhaps in all the Ottoman army,
a tribesman of the renowned Shekh Schimyl, Livd (Bri
gadier-General) Muhammad Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. , who had been detached with his brigade from
Baghdad on this special duty. With this distinguished soldier, and with his senior
officer, the Fank (Major-General) commanding the forces of the Pashalik, much exchange
of courtesies took place during a halt of two days. Courted by the Russian Generals
who have overrun his country, and even attached at one time to the staff of His Imperia'
Majesty the Czar, Muhammad Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. 's Muslim sympathies make him resolutely prefer the
Ottoman service. To the same feeling indeed the Sultan would appear to be indebted for
some of the best swords he can command. Thus a Daghistani Captain on duty near Kirkuk
stated plainly that if he left his children too long in the family home among the Caucasus
the mere growing up under non-Muslim rule would turn them into kdfirs! Among
the Afghans sentiments of the same liberal order are to be found not less deeply rooted.
The winter crops round Kirkuk comprise wheat, barley, beans, and cotton ; the
summer, various pulses and lentils, kidney-beans, tobacco,
melons, cucumbers, and grapes, with, more sparingly,
apples and pears. A very little rice is also grown. Thirty thousand sheep, the property
of its inhabitants, are said to be always in the pastures round the town. Its springs of
naphtha and petroleum perhaps form its most valuable resource commercially.
Situated where several trade routes meet, Kirkuk profits by the passage through it
of merchandise of many kinds. European piece-goods
for local use reach it chiefly from Baghdad; and also, via
Mosul, from Alepo. Prominent among its exports are wool, tobacco, pulses, figs,
raisins, and cheese.
To the Indian army it contributes annually, through the medium of middlemen, or,
as they are called, jambdzes, a number of useful horses
bred in the surrounding villages, as well as a few of a
higher stamp brought in by the Arabs of the Hawija. So vigilantly do professional buyers
lie in wait for such, that a remount officer might easily visit Kirkuk and not find one to
suit him. Thus of upwards of twenty offered, all but one had obviously been seen and
refused by the jamhdzes. That one was bought for £20, rather more than he was worth
at Kirkuk, though in Bombay there is no telling what fancy prices big animals of his
stamp, when not downright cart horses, may fetch. There is no such thing as a Kurdi
horse, except in the sense that horses bred, or owned, by Kurds are so describable.
Arab bloody in some cases dwindled to the last degree, in others greatly mixed with
Turkoman, Persian, and other strains, evidently formed the basis of all the horse stock
seen among the Kurds, though of course accidents have no law, and there is nothing to
prevent a Kurd, more than another, from stealing, or otherwise acquiring, a colt or filly
of the purest Najdian blood. For a government which knew how to foster horse-breed
ing, both the settled and nomadic Kurds would rear colts second to none for military
purposes. A few well chosen stallions posted at Kirkuk would soon change the character
of the horse stock; but as matters stand a superior animal would not be there a week
before he would be taken possession of by some Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. or other official, who again
would probably soon sell him to the jamhdzes. The Sublime Porte's embargo on the
export of horses, while failing of its immediate object, keeps up a general system of
smuggling and corruption. It also heavily handicaps horse breeding as a branch of rural
economy, robs government of the export duty, and, lastly, by rendering public sales, as
at horse fairs, impossible, leads to all the young stock of the country being as it were
spirited out of it by invisible agency An office of the East India Company and, later, of the British Raj, headed by an agent. , without fair buyers having a chance of so much as
seeing it.
Section VIII.—Kirkuk to Sulimania.
The Baghdad escort was relieved by a stronger one at Kirkuk; and many expectant
travellers taking advantage of this, the kdjila became as
Escort strengthened. large and mixed as the baggage of a marching regiment.