JUZEERAH DIRÂZ [or Long Island] is in that quarter.* Silk-worms and their eggs are produced there. We wish you to procure some of both, and to dispatch them to us, together with five or six men, acquainted with the proper mode of rearing them.
We direct, that such of our vessels as import at Muscat be unloaded in two days; and that their export lading of sulphur, lead, copper, &c., be also completed in two days, and the vessels dispatched to Mangalore. If more than four days be consumed in lading and unlading the vessels, you shall be responsible for the extra expence [that may be incurred in consequence]. You must regularly report to us the day each vessel arrives at Muscat, and also the day on which it is dispatched from thence.
N.B. A separate letter to the same person, and of the same date, directs him to engage as servants, and dispatch to Mangalore, ten persons experienced in the pearl fishery.
The Sultan’s distrust of the integrity or diligence of his agent is here strongly manifested; as is also his own want of reflection, in attempting to regulate, with such strictness and precision, the business of loading and unloading vessels, which must necessarily have depended, in a great degree, on the state of the weather and other circumstances, which it might not be in the power of the consul to controul.
The Sultan’s anxiety to establish a pearl fishery on the Coast of Malabar, as well as to introduce the culture of the silk-worm into his dominions, appears to have been very considerable; but I believe that he failed entirely in both attempts.