'SUMMARY OF THE PRINCIPAL EVENTS AND MEASURES OF THE VICEROYALTY OF HIS EXCELLENCY LORD CURZON OF KEDLESTON, VICEROY AND GOVERNOR-GENERAL OF INDIA IN THE FOREIGN DEPARTMENT. I. JANUARY 1899-APRIL 1904. II. DECEMBER 1904-NOVEMBER 1905. VOLUME IV. PERSIA AND THE PERSIAN GULF.' [‎111v] (227/386)

118
rejoined the Boundary Commissioner’s camp. The boundary, however, was not
marked out on the ground, owing to the Persian Government haying failed to
send a man to meet Colonel Holdich’s surveyor. An agreement defining the
boundary based on the sketch was signed at Jalk on 24th March 1896, and was
ratified at Tehran in December 1896. The description of the boundary in the
agreement ran as follows:—“ From pillar 11 northwards, the Talab River
becomes the boundary to its junction with the Mirjawa River. From the point
of junction, it is carried by a straight line to the neaiest point on the watershed
of the Mirjawa range, which limits the drainage into the Mirjawa River on the
north. Thence it follows the main water-shed northward to the highest point of
the Kacha Koh. From the highest point of the Kacha Koh, the line is carried
straight to the highest point of the Malik Siah Koh.”
76. In August 1900 a proposal came from the British Legation at Tehran
for the more accurate demarcation of the boundary from Koh-i-Malik Siah to
the sea, to which the Government of India replied that they would prefer not to
move in the matter for the present. During the following year, however, the
situation changed, and the action of Captain Webb Ware, from our side of the
frontier, and of the Belgian Customs officers, probably under Russian instiga
tion, from the other, forced the question to the front.
77. In April 1901 a band of marauding Damanis attacked and looted a
party of pilgrims near Sahib Chah on the Nushki trade route, and made off with
their booty into the hills south of Koh-i-Taftan. The Damani Sirdar Leader of a tribe or a polity; also refers to a military rank or title given to a commander of an army or division. , when
called on to surrender the raiders, not only declined to do so, but assumed so
threatening an attitude that Captain Webb Ware considered it necessary to secure
the trade route from attack by establishing a post on the flank which w T as
threatened. With this object a small force of levies was located at Padaha, the
patch of cultivation on the left bank of the stream passing Mirjawa which
Captain Webb Ware considered to be the Mirjawa river. On the interpretation
of the Boundary Agreement, which was adopted by the Government of India,
when the point afterwards came under discussion, Padaha was undoubtedly on
the right bank of the dry torrent bed which Colonel Holdich apparently regarded
as the Mirjawa river, and Captain Webb Ware’s action in establishing a military
post on the other side of the line marked on the map, without reference to the
Government of India for instructions, was censured by His Majesty’s Govern
ment. In the absence of demarcation, however, the real line of the boundary
w T as no doubt open to argument, and there was little reason to suppose that the
Persian Government, if left to itself, would have felt in any way injured by this
defensive advance on the debatable land in the neighbourhood of Padaha, had it
not been that it interfered with the designs which the Russians—who had showm
their interest in the Perso-Baluch frontier from the time (1895) of M. Zaroudny
onwards intended carrying out for the pushing of their influence through the
Belgian Customs officials.
In October 1901 M. Miller, the Russian Vice Consul, left Seistan, and
after baiting at Nasratabad in the endeavour to induce Mir Jihand Khan, the
Damani outlaw (with whom he had been in correspondence), to visit him, pro
ceeded out of his jurisdiction to Kerman, where he devoted his time to discuss
ing the Koh-i*Malik Siah-Mashkel section of the Perso-Baluch border with
the Karguzar and Go\ernor-General of Kerman. In the same month, the
Director of Customs at Seistan received instructions from Tehran to establish
Customs posts at Kohi-Malik Siah and to the south of that range, and although
M. Montor, after visiting the country, condemned the scheme as a useless and
unnecessary expense, in December 1901 peremptory orders reached him to carry
out his instructions. In discussing with our Vice Consul the rejection of his
■views, M. Molitor did not hesitate to ascribe the orders for the establishment
of the new Customs posts to Russian influence at Tehran, and of the correct
ness of this ^ iew r there can be little doubt when the sequence of events is
lemembcred and having regard to the strategical importance of Mirjawa to
the Russians in connection with their scheme for a railway to the sea. In
November 1901, a young Customs official named Cesari, of doubtful antece
dents, was despatched from Seistan, and established posts at Koh-i-Malik Siah,
Duzuap and Ladis, without any friction with Captain Webb Ware’s men,