'Seistan' [‎271r] (541/782)

Dated Camp Dch Gtil Shah, Seistan, the 31st January 190-4.
From Colonel A. H. McMahon, C.S.I., C.I.E., British Commissioner for Seistan
Arbitration Commission,
To L. W. Dane, Esq., Secretary to the Government of India in the Foreign
Department.
Since I last bombarded you with letters just before you started for the Persian Gulf The historical term used to describe the body of water between the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. , I
have given you a fairly long respite. Many thanks for your long letter of 5th January . I
know how busy you are, and it is very good of you to write. \
As for ourselves, we are slowly marking time along the Border, ready> to begin demarcation
work directly the Amir writes accepting my award. So far all this'delay is playing our
game, but I am very anxious to polish off demarcation without further delay, as the time is
approaching when the rivers wall rise, and the country from Kohak northwards will get hope
lessly difficult to work in. After demarcation I can always delay as long as is necessary in
giving the water award, and I do not propose to give that until I get a ‘Mine clear” from,
you.
"We have been having a more than ordinary rough time of it for some weeks what with
snow, cold, and wet. We are all fit and well, however, and very well case hardened to weather.
Duck shooting has been a total failure, so life is very monotonous. No one will play with us
now-a-days. I did think we might have a little innocent amusement with the passport system,
but the Yamin scented danger, and has ordered the passport business to be stopped while the
Mission is here. This is subject, of course, to sanction from Tehran, and they may be foolish
enough to start it again.
The Customs are again giving trouble, and I have had to send a rather strongly worded
telegram to Tehran.
We are all willing to stay on here as long as we are serving a useful purpdse, but I
sincei’ely trust we may be spared another Seistan summer. Apart from other troubles, a
Seistan summer in tents is fearfully trying to one's eyes, owing to heat, wind, dust, and glare.
I have some misgivings as to how my own optics will stand another summer. They are
somewhat the worse for wear already.
We are by no means idle here, and are working away steadily with survey, irrigation, and
general investigation work. We have made innumerable lines of levels across Seistan in
every possible direction, and these will be some day of great interest and value.
I have also nearly completed what may be called a settlement report of the country,
both Afghan and Seistan, which contains a great mass of detailed local information.
The more one works at this country the more astonishing its possibilities prove to be.
W T e find we can rely on a larger area of culturable and commandable ground than that stated
in my previous report;—also that any high level canal taken from or above Bund-i-Kamal
Khan would bring large areas of Dasht in Persian Seistan, not included in former calculations,
under flood irrigation. Another very important discovery is that of very large, extensive,
and natural storage reservoirs in Persian Seistan itself, where flood water can be easily stored
and used for irrigating large low-lying areas, thereby ensuring their cultivation in years of
low river, and enabling in ordinary years the water now expended on those areas to be used
elsewhere.
I am glad too to find that good cotton can be grown in Seistan. This would be an
important asset, if encouraged.
As far as Persian Seistan is concerned, the present population would suffice to carry out
all possible extensions of cultivation. They can be a hardworking people when they like,
but the present iniquitous revenue svstem prevents their cultivating more than enough for
bare subsistence. We should have no trouble with them, for they openly express the hope
that we will take over this country some day, and are fond of talking among themselves of
the agricultural progress they would make under our rule.
It would be a safe and profitable investment to lend Persia some 1^ millions on the
hypothecation of Seistan alone, or to pay £60,000 per annum for the lease of it. This is a
merely commercial view of the case. It would pay to increase those figures from the strategic
point of view.
If, as I think is probable, we hear more of the sale of Seistan revenue grain to the
Bussian Bank, there need be no logical impediment to our demanding the sale or lease to us
of Seistan revenues. As next door proprietors to Seistan, we have the right of preemption.
1 here are other matters in your letter which I am carefully considering and will write
about them separately later. The issue of present negotiations between Japan and Russia
will materially affect the treatment of these and similar problems.
How encouraging it must be to read tbe drivel that is being talked at home about
political moves so obviously important and imperative as Tibet. Cotton is capable of any
thing, but it did surprise me to hear that Fitzpatrick strongly opposed action in Tibet on the
ground that our army in India is not large enough.
I hope you are none the worse for all the heavy strain of recent work.