"الاتجار بالأسلحة في مسقط. ١٩٠٨-١٩٠٩." [و‎‎٣‎٥] (١٢٨/٧٤)

33
he may well have spent as much as R s .
1,250.
The traders say that after deducting
their expenses at Rs. 20 per rifle they
make a profit of 400 to 450 per cent, on
each rifle, and in addition to this they are
one camel to the good on each lot of 20
rifles.
Answers to miscellaneons questions.
These points were not mentioned in the ori
ginal instructions given to our men.
1* Last year after the Afghans had their
dhow captured by the gunboat at Jashk,
they wanted to attack the British Con
sulate there. They were dissuaded from
this by Mir Barkat Khan (who was running
oil their business) as he said be would get
into trouble.
2. This year there was no talk of attack
ing the Consulate or Telegraph Station,
nor ol damaging the telegraph and tele
phone lines.
3. The Afghans apparently do not con
nect their loss of last year with the Tele
graph Department, they think it was en
tirely due to the gun-boats. Our men did
not hear Mr. New’s name mentioned.
From what they saw and heard, the
gun-runners considered themselves per
fectly safe when once they had landed
their arms on the Persian coast.
4. Our men heard and saw nothing of
dhows flying the French flag.
The Sultan of Masqat is reported to have 5. Neither Afghans nor Masqat mer-
bought recently six cannons for his own use. chants men ti 0 ned Orders for caDDOn or
machine guns.
6. The Afghans have no system of
espionage on the Navy. The nakhudas
do whatever there is to be done in this
line. They seem to be quite confident
of giving the gun-boats the slip.
7. The Afghans say that they mean to
fight hard if the gun-boats attack them.
They hear that in last year’s fight thjir
Mauser bullets went through the side of
the gun-boats, and they now think that
they will be able to do a lot of damage
to the crews.