132 
APPENDIX TO REPORT FROM SELECT COMMITTEE 
Appendix, No. 8. 
(Secret Department.—No. 10 of 1860.) 
MUSCAT-ZANZIBAK COMMISSION. 
Brigadier 
Coqhlan’s 
Report. 
* Government 
records, Persian 
Gulf, p. 237. 
t Letter, No. 47 of 
1859. 
From Brigadier W. M. Coghlan, Political Resident at Aden, to H. X. Anderson, Esq., 
Acting Chief Secretary to Government, Bombay ; dated Bombay, 4 July 1860. 
Sir, 
I HAVE the honour to submit the following report of my inquiries and proceedings at 
Muscat for the information of the Honourable the Governor in Council. 
2. After touching at the Island of Hallania, where the “Punjaub” remained two days, 
she proceeded to Muscat, and arrived there on the morning ot the 12th ultimo. Hadji 
Ahmed, the Vizier of his Highness, Syud Thoweynee, came on board shortly after, 
and to him I entrusted the two letters addressed to his Highness by the Honourable the 
Governor of Bombay. Arrangements were made at the same time for our complimentary 
visit, which took place the same afternoon. 
3. Syud Thoweynee was extremely gratified with the tenor of Sir George Clerk’s 
letter setting forth the object of the Commission. He was also much pleased with the 
appointment of Mr. Rassam to the Acting British Agency at Muscat, and expressed his 
gratitude towards the Government for the arrangement which had thus been made for settling 
the long-pending differences between himself and his brother Syud Majeed at Zanzibar. 
His Highness’s reply to the Honourable the Governor, which was forwarded with my 
letter. No. 7, of the 25th June, dwells on these points so fully that further notice of them 
is superfluous. 
4. In the course of seven subsequent interviews, extending over our stay of nine days 
at Muscat, every effort was made to elicit information which might tend to throw light 
on the points in dispute, and Syud Thoweynee was repeatedly urged to state the 
grounds on which he rested his claim to the suzerainty of Zanzibar, and to the payment 
of tribute by his brother Majeed. I further deemed it fair to give his Highness an oppor 
tunity of exculpating himself from the various charges which had been brought against 
him in the official correspondence already submitted to Government on the Muscat- 
Zanzibar question. 
5. Until corresponding inquiries have been made at Zanzibar, I am necessarily unable 
to form a decisive judgment on the opposing claims of the two parties; I shall, therefore, 
confine myself, at present, to a statement of Syud Thoweynee’s case, as represented by 
himself, merely adding thereto occasional remarks in elucidation of the same, and con 
firmatory, or otherwise, of the arguments adduced by him. The documentary evidence 
obtained has been thrown together in an Appendix, and will be referred to as occasion 
may require. The translations were made by the Rev. Mr. Badger from correct copies 
duly collated with the original papers. 
6. I was glad to find the question regarding succession simplified by the repeated 
admission of Syud Thoweynee, that whatever claims are, theoretically, attached to 
primogeniture, practically, and more especially in the case of his ancestry of the reigning 
family, such claims have generally been disregarded. This coincides with the opinion of 
Colonel Hamilton,* that “ primogeniture, amongst Arabs, is not acknowledged as giving 
“ any bona fide right to succession,” and corroborates a similar statement made by Colonel 
Rio-by,t “ that the rights of primogeniture have never been recognised among the Imams 
“ of Oman.” 
7. Further, I find on inquiry that Syud Thoweynee does not found his claim to 
supremacy on the bare fact that he was nominated by his late father^ to succeed to the 
government of his Arabian possessions ; but insists rather on his position as the actual 
ruler of Omán, which, in his opinion, constitutes him the rightful sovereign over all the 
dependencies of the parent State. He meets the argument adduced to prove that the late 
Imâm possessed the right of disposing of his dominions at will, by inquiring in what other 
oro-anised State, whatever the form of Government may be, the sovereign is endowed with 
any- such prerogative. And he finally contends that no such disposal of his territories was 
ever made by his late father, either by will or otherwise. ^ The only will extant is in his 
own possession, and he maintains that the bequests comprised therein have reference solely 
to the personal property of the testator, except the clause which directs that “ his two 
« ships, the ‘ Caroline ’ and ‘ Feidh Alim,’ be given after his death to the treasury of the 
“ Mussulmans, as a legacy from him.” Syud Thoweynee considers this latter bequest 
as a virtual recognition of one public exchequer, and that the Treasury of Muscat ( Muscat 
being the parent State) is indicated thereby. With regard to the letter addressed by his 
father, Syud Saeed, to the Earl of Aberdeen, dated Zanzibar, 23rd July 1844, and a 
letter from Colonel Hamerton to his Lordship, dated the 31st of the same month, which 
appears to have accompanied it (copies of which from Colonel Rigby’s letter. No. 46, of 
1859, are given in Appendix A ), Syud Thoweynee argues, in the first place, that the 
appointment of his elder brother, Khaled, to the Governorship of his father’s African 
possessions.