The Wenatchee daily world. [volume] (Wenatchee, Wash.) 1905-1971, 1910-08-17
THE PLIGHT OF PERSIA
By Fred Simpich


nation The Peacock Throne-the
Kingdom of the Lion and the Sun"
has endured for $500 years. The
Persians used to sack India and rob
the Nabobs as much for sport as for
the money. Their proves as horse
men and warriors is famous in the
annals Of the east. But there is moth
ing in the aspect of arid, crumbling
Persia today to remind one of her
past glory and power. The towns
and Villages are dwindling away,
the fields are turning to deserts, and
the people have become a vanishing
race The sporting blood of the sur
vivors still flows, however-or maybe
it is only their ignorant conceit. AT
any rate they still call their Shah the
King of Kings" and think Teheran
the center of the universe. They
say too that God placed Mount De-
mavend (1S,500 feet near Teheran
as a mighty monument marking the
middle of the world. Vast caves of
precious stones are hidden in the
bosom of Demavend, guarded by
great snakes and fierce Genii, the
Persian peasants will also tell you
Maybe so. If there is any money
left in Persia it must be hidden some
where and guarded so well that even
the Persians can't get at it Most
of the Shah's once famous jewels
were long since pawned at Peters
berg, or solu to pay for trips to Eu-
rope. Russia alone has lent millions
to Persia, and no one versed in the
politics of Teheran sees how the
Shah can ever pay this money back.
Persia is a land of the Has Beens,
of glory gone forever, Of ruin and
decay. The horses and mules, the
people, the ragged clothes they wear
and the coarse food they eat, the
wretched novels they live in, all con-
tribute to the sad spectacle of uni
versal poverty and national decay.
For years past the barren, arid
country has produced less than it
has consumed, by $10,000,000 per
annum. And regardless of the big
loans raised from foreign powers,
Persia has not one good public
building, a railroad, an irrigation
canal, a developed mine or a decent
ly equipped company Of soldiers, to
show for all of her borrowed money.
For days | have ridden along the
rough, broken mule trails that afford
the sole means of communication in
Persia, and everywhere is evidence
of the direst poverty. To the right
ana left, all along the trail are
strewn the ruins of abandoned vii
liages, mute witnesses to disappear
ing race Some of these Villages
show signs of having been deserted
but a few years ago. The slow des-
sication that is spreading all over
middle Asia is showing itself most of
all in Persia The arid, ruined fields
are so poor, water is so scarce and
vegetation so sparse that it is diff
cult to see how the Persians keep
alive at all, even though they num-
Der only 10 per square mile, or
about Z, 100000 for the whole of
Persia. Most of the people left in
Persia are found in the north provi-
noes, fringeing the Capsian Sea. To
the south, from Teheran to the Gulf,
stretches a high, dry plateau, scored
by ravines and canyons, and traver-
sed by ranges of barren mountains.
Mineral deposits exists, but nearly
every attempt to work mines in Per-
STA has bankrupted the promoters.
No progress can be made without
railroads, and in all Persia only 5
miles of railway exists, and this is
run at loss. In the past 35 years
most of the Shah's Office hours have
been devoted to granting and revok-
ing railway and mining concessions,
not a single one of which have been
successful Eastern capitalists still
talk of the famous Baron Rueter
concessions the Tobacco Monopoly,
etc., and the late history of Persia
is rich with tales of schemes that
failed. Winter is the open season
for concession hunters at Teheran;
they work their charms, get a char
ter, and HE themselves back to Lon
don or Paris to peddle it.
A long time ago Persia was an ag-
| ricultural country, and old poetry is
| full of references to the fruits and
flowers of the land of the Lion and
| the Sun But today, save only In
small patches about the foot of snow
clad mountains, or near the few fast
disappearing rivers, there is no Gull
tivated land. The sun is so hot
and the soil is so dry and sandy that
water will not run through irriga-
ton bitches on the surface OF the
earth, as we use it in the western
states. So the ingenious Persians
have invented what they call a
'Kanat" system They carry the
water for miles in underground chan
nels, built at great cost of time and