Pershing
JOHN JOSEPH, an American general. He was born in Lynn co., Mo., in 1860, and was graduated at the United States Military Academy, West Point, in 1886, as senior cadet captain, on which he received his commission as second lieutenant in the Sixth United States Cavalry, getting his first experience of warfare in the Apache In- GENERAL JOHN J. PERSHING Moro province, continuing his campaigns till they culminated in victory in June, 1913. He then was engaged in department work till the Mexican crisis of 1915, when he was put in command of the punitive expedition against Francisco Villa. It was in this year that he lost his wife and three children in a conflagration at the Presidio, San Francisco. In May, 1917, Pershing was made commander-inchief of the American Expeditionary Forces destined for Europe and went ahead of the army in the following month. In October he was made full general, and following the appointment 2 40 3 amir 4 36 5 34 6 32 7 30 8 28 9 PERSIA PERSIA of Foch as generalissimo of all the Allied mountains appear to be a confused forces, he placed the American army at heap of hills piled upon hills, in his disposal. During the war he worked grand but indefinite order; while in close association with the French gen- each individual hill appears a mass eral, and on his return to the United of gray rock reared block on block, or States received a great popular welcome.
Toward Toward the end of the war French, Italian, British, and American honors were showered upon him. Sept. 4, 1919, confirmed by Senate as General of the Armies of the United States.
PERSIA (Persian Iran), an extensive country of Asia, bounded on the N. by the Caspian Sea, the Transcaspian and Transcaucasian provinces of Russia; S. starting in huge bowlders abruptly from the face of the plains or plateaux. The plains, again, are vast naked steppes, destitute of trees or foliage; and it is only on the margin of water courses, or the banks of rivers, that either villages or vegetation of any abundance are found.
The provinces, however, along the S. and W. margin of the Caspian are an exception to the rest of the country, and present some of the most beautiful and fruit- コロ A TEMPLE AT URUMIAH, PERSIA by Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean; E. by Russian territory, Afghanistan and Baluchistan, and W. by Asiatic Turkey.
Its length obliquely from N. W. to S. E. is 1,500 miles; area, about 628,000 square miles. Pop. about 10,000,000.
Topography. On the N. W. and S., several lofty mountain ranges-some of considerable length, others short and abrupt-intersect the land in many directions, the center of the country consisting in general of a vast plain or tableland. The lowest or most level portions of the country lie along the bed of the Tigris and the shore of the Persian Gulf.
Persia possesses many extensive plains and barren deserts, and the interior is generally bare, bleak, and arid. The ful pictures of richness and abundance to be found in Persia. It has been computed that barely a third of the entire kingdom is fit for cultivation; and, though husbandry is well attended to, and the advantages of copious irrigation are thoroughly understood, so little encouragement is given by the state to agriculture that but a small part of the capable soil is tilled. The most important rivers are the Aras, Murghab or Bendemir, Atrek, Sefid-Rud, and__the Tigris. The lakes of most note are Urumiah, or Shalu, Bakhtegan, and Mahdigla; from these, and from minor streams and bodies of water, an elaborate system of irrigation is effected all over the cultivated grounds, while vast sub- PERSIA terranean aqueducts convey the water to more remote situations.
Productions and Climate. The vegetable productions of Persia embrace all kinds of legumes and cereals, except rye, oats, and rice; barley and wheat are the most abundant crops. Drugs of various kinds are obtained, such as senna, rhubarb, gums, opium, etc.; as also oils oils, cotton, indigo, sugar, madder, dates, pistachio nuts, and tobacco; while in flowers, and the perfumes extracted from them, especially the attar of roses, no country in the world can compare with Persia for beauty, fragrance, and abundance.
Silk is an important item; and plantations of mulberry trees of great extent are very numerous. Vast flocks of sheep and goats are pastured over the country, the property and wealth of the wandering tribes of the interior, the Eelauts, a kind of Bedouins, devoting themselves to pastoral habits. The animals for which Persia is famous are camels, horses, mules, oxen, asses, and buffalos.
The mineral wealth consists of silver, copper, lead, iron, antimony, salt, precious stones-especially turquoise-bitu- -bitumen, and springs of naphtha. There are also large, undeveloped fields of coal and petroleum. One of the features of Persia is the abundance of salt in the soil, and the large number of its salt lakes; about 30 pure salinas have no outlet; and one, the largest, Urumiah, is 280 miles in circumference, and, though supplied by 14 rivers, its water is so dense, bitter, and loaded with salt, that no fish can live in it. Another, called the Bakhtegan, is 42 miles long. Situated near the former are some remarkable ponds, whose waters are petrifying. The climate of Persia embraces the rigors experienced on the mountains of the snowy N., and the heat felt on the sandy plains of Africa. Cyrus the younger told Xenophon that his father's empire was so vast that in the N. the people perished of cold, and in the S. were suffocated with heat.
Manufactures. - The manufactures of Persia are numerous and important, and embrace all kinds of silk fabrics, satins, taffetas, textures of silk and cotton, silk and goat's hair, or silk and camel's hair; brocades, camel's hair shawls, gold tissues, gold velvet, camlets, carpets, cottons, leather, firearms, sword blades, saddlery and jewelry.
Commerce. The imports of 1917-1918 amounted to £15,602,200, and the exports to $11,290,500. The chief imports were cotton, sugar, rice, manufactures of iron and steel, petroleum, and yarn. The chief exports were fruits, cotton, opium, animals, petroleum, and carpets. In PERSIA 1917-1918 the industries suffered from drought and famine, which were followed by an epidemic of influenza, which greatly reduced the population. The harvest of 1919 was excellent and promised a revival of activity. Industry in general suffered by interruption of commerce with Russia, which before the World War had been large.
Transportation. -In August, 1919, the British Government signed an agreement with Persia providing for the construction of railways and other forms of transportation. There were in 1920 less than 100 miles of railway. Practically all the traffic is carried on by roads, and these for the most part are poor. There are about 6,500 miles of telegraph line.
Finance. There are no available figures later than 1913-1914. At that time the revenue amounted to £1,480,778. The gross customs receipts in 1916-1917 were approximately £850,000.
Government. Up to 1906 Persia was an absolute monarchy resembling in its form of government Turkey. The shah was the absolute ruler. In 1905 the people demanded representative government and in January, 1906, the shah gave his consent to the establishment of a national council. This, however, was never established and it ceased to exist as a legislative body in 1915. The government of the country is in the hands of a cabinet consisting of eight ministers. It is divided into 33 provinces, each of which is governed by a governor-general.
Language and History. - The Persian language ge is the most celebrated of all the Oriental tongues, for strength, copiousness, beauty, and melody, and is written from the right to the the left. Persia is divided into 12 provinces, namely: Azerbaijan, Kurdistan, Luristan, and Khusistan, on the W.; Farsistan, Laristan, and Kirman, on the shores of the Persian Gulf, or S.; Irak-Ajemi and Khorassan, in the interior; and Ghilan, Mazanderan and Astrabad, in the N., or along the Caspian shores. The modern capital is Teheran. The earliest account we possess of Persia is from the Bible, from which we learn that, in the time of Abraham, 1921 B. c., that portion of modern Persia known as Elam, or Suisiana, southern Persia, was a powerful monarchy. But the Persians, as a nation, first rose into notice on the ruins of the great empires founded on the Euphrates.
Babylon was taken by Cyrus, and his empire extended wider than any before established in the world. It comprised, on one side, the W. of India; on the other, Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt; and was only bounded by the prodigies of valor with which the Greeks defended PERSIA their small territory. After a feeble struggle, it succumbed to the brave and disciplined armies of Alexander. It was then split into fragments by the decease of its founder; but Greeks and Greek sovereigns continued, during several centuries, to reign over Asia. About two centuries before Christ, Arsaces founded the monarchy of the Parthians; and in the 3d century arose the dynasty of the Sassanidæ, who restored the name, with the religion and laws, of ancient Persia.
They were overthrown by the Mohammedan invaders, who suffered in their turn from the successive invasions by the descendants of Genghis, Timur, and by the Turks, who entirely changed the aspect of western Asia. At length, in 1501, a native dynasty again arose, under Ismail, who placed himself on the throne.
His posterity having sunk into voluptuousness, Persia, in the beginning of the 18th century, was overrun by the Afghans, who carried fire and sword through its remotest extremities, and reduced its proudest capitals to ashes. The atrocities of the Afghans were avenged, and the independence of Persia vindicated by Nadir Shah, but though the victories of this daring chief threw a luster on his country, after his death it was almost torn to pieces by civil war, till the fortune of arms gave a decided superiority to Kereim, or Kurreem Khan.
His death gave rise to another disputed succession, with civil wars as furious as before. At length, Aga Mahommed, a eunuch, raised himself, by crimes and daring, to the sovereignty, and not only swayed it during his lifetime, but founded a dynasty represented by Nassr-ed- Din, who was born in 1831, and ascended PERSIA posed. He was succeeded in 1909 by his son, Mohammed Ahmed Mirza, a child of eleven. An attempt was made by the government to reform the finances by the employment of W. Morgan Shuster, an American, as Treasurer-General. He was given large powers and did efficient work, but was obliged to resign through gh the opposition of Russia. His dismissal was followed by disorders and uprisings which lasted until the outbreak of the World War. The Persian Government in November, 1914, declared its neutrality.
In spite of this, however, both the Turks and Russians considered Persian territory adjacent to their own as a legitimate theater of war, and much of the fighting between the Turks and the Russians spread from the Caucasus over northwest Persia, and there were successive invasions by armies of both Russia and Turkey. The Persian Government was unable to defend its neutrality and the Khurdish tribesmen took advantage of this weakness. They overran northwest Persia and massacred thousands of Armenian and Nestorian Christians residing in the province of Azerbaijan. At the end of April, 1915, over 40,000 Armenians and other Chris Christians had had been forced to flee from this province. The Russians continued their advance into Persia toward the end of 1916, while the S. E. corner was occupied by Anglo- Egyptian forces under General Sykes.
Throughout 1917 and 1918 the northern part of Persia was the scene of much fighting, in which Turkish, Russian, British, and Armenian forces took part. (See WORLD WAR.) Persia was represented at the Peace Conference and addressed a memorandum to the Powers declaring it the throne in 1848. His son, Muzaffar- to be the desire of Persia to be comed-Din, succeeded him in 1896. He died in 1907 and was succeeded by Mohammed Ali Mirza, his son. The people, dissatisfied with the incompetency and corruption of the government, demanded a constitution in 1906. The shah yielded and a national mejliss or parliament assembled on Oct. 7, 1906. Shortly after the shah abdicated and was succeeded by Mohammed Ali, his son. By the new constitution, parliament gained control of the finances of the kingdom. This was bitterly opposed by the shah and the party which supported him. In 1909 the shah compelled the cabinet to resign and the prime minister was exiled. Martial law was declared and the parliament was dissolved by a body of Cossacks sent by Russia to aid the shah. Civil war followed, in which the Nationalists were generally successful. The larger cities fell into their hands and the shah fled for safety to the Russian Legation. Parliament was recalled and the shah was depletely independent and self-governing, and asserted that the Anglo-Russian agreement of 1907 and 1916 had produced great harm, and requested that it be annulled. On Aug. 9, 1919, Great Britain and Persia signed an agreement whereby Great Britain undertook to maintain order and develop the resources of the country. The shah visited England, France, and other countries of Europe in 1919. Early in 1920 a British syndicate secured permission to develop railway lines in Persia. There were strong attempts on the part of the Bolshevik government of Russia to obtain political possession of Persia, in 1920, and the government urged Great Britain and the League of Nations to aid it in repelling the invasion of the Bolshevist troops who had seized the province of Ghilan, where they had established a Soviet republic. The Bolshevist forces retired, following the operations against General Wrangel in south Russia.
FERSIAN GULF PERSPECTOGRAPH