'Persia and the Persian Question by the Hon. George Nathaniel Curzon, M.P.' [‎224] (259/714)

224
PERSIA
able and in many cases the sole asset of which Nature can here
boast. One of these disputes between Afghanistan and Persia
had been raging for some time before my visit, concerning a
border district named Hashtadan, on the parallel between Kuhsan
and Ghurian. The British, who are usually appealed to on these
occasions as umpires, and who have more than once undertaken
what is apt to be a very thankless task, were invited to arbitrate
and a decision was given which, I dare say, had what MacGregor
thought the superlative merit of dissatisfying both parties. I
only allude to it as typical of the incidents that must constantly
recur upon a boundary so ill-defined, assisted in most parts by no
natural features, and peopled by nomad tribes who care very little
for posts or pillars.
The second section is the frontier of Seistan, as defined by the
Anglo-Perso-Afghan Boundary Commission under Sir F. Goldsmid
in 1872, which will form the main subject of this chapter.
2. Seistan 0 f this section from north to south is about
120 miles ; but as the new frontier, fixed by the arbitration, pursues
a wide deviation to the south-east until it touches the river Hel-
mund, and then turns again in a south-westerly direction, the
length of the two outer sides of the triangle thus described is
considerably greater than that of the hypotenuse.
Third in order comes a stretch of boundary from the southern
end of the Seistan frontier, fixed in 1872, to the northern end of
the Mekran boundary, demarcated in the previous year;
BeVuch 0 or, in other words, from the Kuh-Malek-i-Siah to Jalk, a
boundary Stance of 200 miles. This section of the border has
never been defined at all. No one knows where or what it is. No
two maps colour it alike ; and the majority compound for ignorance
by obvious conjecture, drawing a straight line in a south-easterly
direction from the mountains named above to the neighbourhood
of Jalk. Beluchistan is here the neighbour of Persia on the
east; but the wandering Beluch tribes who camp upon the frontier
own very little allegiance to the Khan of Kelat, and are practically
independent.
Lastly comes the line from Jalk to the port of Gwetter. on the
sea, 130 miles in length, which I call the Mekran boundary,
4 Mekran because that part of Beluchistan which it divides between
boundary Persia and Kelat is known by that name. It was de
fined under conditions of peculiar difficulty by Sir F. Goldsmid in