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Updated: June 23, 2025
The Persian Gulf is an inlet of the Indian Ocean, and is enclosed between Persia and Arabia. The island of Bahrein on the Arabian coast is well known; it is under British protection, and here in summer and autumn pearl fishing is carried on, the annual export of these beautiful precious stones being now about £900,000.
The value, in rupees, of the exports of rose-water from Bushire in 1879, were 4,000 to India, 1,500 to Java, 200 to Aden and the Red Sea, 1,000 to Muscat and dependencies, 200 to Arab coast of Persian Gulf and Bahrein, 200 to Persian coast and Mekran, and 1,000 to Zanzibar.
In fact I have heard English sea captains who had drunk salt water for years say that they never saw better harbour boats in a storm than these of Bahrein. In another kind of boat the pearl-divers of the Gulf go out to their hard toil and costly labour. One of them costs about four hundred rupees, that is about one hundred and thirty dollars.
The Adari well is one of the great sights of Bahrein, being a deep basin of water 22 yards wide by 40 long, beautifully clear, and full of prismatic colours. It is said to come up with such force from underground that a diver is driven back, and all around it are ruins of ancient date, proving that it was prized by former inhabitants as a bath.
In the following year the Portuguese governor, Dom Luis de Menezes, came to terms with him, and appointed him Portuguese representative in the island. A few years later, one Ras Bardadim, guazil, or governor of Bahrein, made himself objectionable, and against him Simeon d'Acunha was sent. He and many of his men died of fever in the expedition, but the Portuguese power was again restored.
During the reigns of Sultan Saoud and his son Sultan Saoud Sayid, a large part of the Arabian mainland was under the rule of Oman, as also Bahrein, Hormuz, Larij, Kishm, Bandar Abbas, many islands and their pearl fisheries, and Linga, also a good part of the coast of Africa; and it was they who established the alliances with England and the United States.
Further up the Persian Gulf missionaries have long been established on the islands of Bahrein, which are under British protection. Continuing our journey eastward, we can dismiss the Shiahs of Persia as outside our pan-Islamic calculations, for their pilgrim-centre is at Kerbela, some twenty odd miles west of the Euphrates and the site of ancient Babylon.
He that plougheth should plough in hope. We may not be able to see a harvest yet in this country but, furrow after furrow, the soil is getting ready for the seed. Don't some of you want to come and do a day's ploughing for the King? There are some splendid stretches of virgin prairie yet untouched between Bahrein and Mecca.
In the blue waters of the Persian Gulf there lies a coral island called Bahrein. At a few hundred yards to the northeast of it is a still smaller island shaped like a pack-saddle, where palm trees and white coral rock houses are reflected in the salt water at high tide. The little island town is called Moharrek, that is, the "Burning Place," because it is very hot there in summer.
This day is, however, postponed indefinitely until such times as England, Turkey, and Russia shall see fit to settle their differences; and with a better understanding between these Powers, and the development of railways in the East, the Persian Gulf may yet once more become a high road of commerce, and the Bahrein Islands may again come into notice.
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