CHAPTER XIII
Cash and wealth—Capital as understood by Persians—Hidden fortunes—Forms of extravagance—Unbusiness-like qualities—Foreign examples—Shaken confidence of natives in foreigners—Greed for money—Small merchants—Illicit ways of increasing wealth—The Persian a dreamer—Unpunctuality—Time no money and no object—Hindrance to reform—Currency—Gold, silver, and copper—Absorption of silver—Drainage of silver into Transcaspia—Banknotes—The fluctuations of the Kran—How the poorer classes are affected by it—Coins old and new—Nickel coins—The Shai and its subdivisions.
The Persian does not understand the sound principles on which alone extensive business can be successful. Partly owing to prevailing circumstances he is under the misapprehension that hard cash is synonymous with wealth, and does not differentiate between treasure, savings, and savings transformed into capital. This is probably the main cause of the present anaemic state of business in the Shah's Empire. Thus, when we are told there is in Persia enormous "capital" to be invested, we are not correctly informed. There are "enormous accumulations of wealth" lying idle, but there is no "capital" in the true meaning of the word. These huge sums in hard cash, in jewellery, or bars of gold and silver, have been hidden for centuries in dark cellars, and for any good they are to the country and commerce at large might as well not exist at all.
Partly owing to the covetousness of his neighbours, partly owing to a racial and not unreasonable diffidence of all around him, and to the fact that an Asiatic always feels great satisfaction in the knowledge that he has all his wealth within his own reach and protection, rich men of Persia take particular care to maintain the strictest secrecy about their possessions, and to conceal from the view of their neighbours any signs which might lead them to suspect the accumulation of any such wealth. We have already seen how even the houses of the wealthiest are purposely made humble outwardly so as to escape the notice of rapacious officials, and it is indeed difficult to distinguish from the outside between the house of a millionaire and that of a common merchant.
The Persian, it must be well understood, does not hide his accumulated treasure from avaricious reasons; on the contrary, his inclinations are rather toward extravagance than otherwise, which extravagance he can only satisfy under a mask of endless lies and subterfuges. No honest ways of employing his wealth in a business-like and safe manner are open to the rich Persian under the present public maladministration, nor have the foreign speculations in the country offered sufficient examples of success to induce natives to embark upon them again. Far from it; these enterprises have even made Persians more sceptical and close than before, and have certainly not shown foreign ways of transacting business at the best.
That is why, no other way being open to him, the Persian who does wish to get rid of his wealth, prefers to squander his money, both capital and income (the latter if he possesses land), in luxurious jewellery and carpets, and in unhealthy bribery and corruption, or in satisfying caprices which his voluptuous nature may suggest. The result? The Persian is driven to live mostly for his vanity and frivolity—two unbusiness-like qualities not tending to the promotion of commercial enterprise on a large scale, although it is true that in a small way his failings give rise and life to certain industries. For instance, even in remote, poor and small centres where food is scarce and the buildings humble, one invariably finds a goldsmith, filigree-workers and embroidery makers, whereas the necessaries of life may be more difficult to obtain.
Of course Persia contains a comparatively small number of Persians of a more adventurous nature, men who have travelled abroad and have been bitten with the Western desire for speculation to increase their money with speed, if not always with safety; but even these men have mostly retired within their shells since the colossal fiascos of the speculations started in Persia by foreign "company promoters." A considerable number of Persians, seduced by glowing prospectuses and misplaced faith in everything foreign, were dreadfully taken in by the novel experiments—everything novel attracts the Persian considerably—and readily unearthed solid gold and silver bars, that had lain for centuries in subterranean hiding-places, and now came out to be converted into shares in the various concerns, hardly worth the paper on which they were printed, but promising—according to the prospectus—to bring the happy possessors fabulous incomes.
We have seen how the Sugar Refinery, the Glass Factory, the "Gas" Company—a more appropriate name could not have been given—and the ill-fated Mining Company have created well-founded suspicion of foreign ways of increasing one's capital, nor can we with any fairness blame the Persians for returning to their old method of slow accumulation. True enough, a fortune, if discovered, has a fair possibility of being seized in the lump by a greedy official, but that is only a possibility; whereas, when invested in some foreign speculations the loss becomes a dead certainty! More even than the actual loss of the money, the Persians who burned their fingers by meddling with foreign schemes felt the scorn of their friends, of whom they had become the laughing stock.
There is no doubt that to-day the confidence of the natives towards foreigners has been very much shaken, and excepting a few men whom they well know, trust and respect, they regard most Europeans as adventurers or thieves. The "treasuring" of capital instead of the investment of it is, therefore, one of the reasons why industries in Persia seldom assume large proportions. It is only the small merchant, content to make a humble profit, who can prosper in his own small way while more extensive concerns are distrusted.
But it must not be understood that Persians do not care for money. There is, on the contrary, hardly a race of people on the face of the earth with whom the greed for money is developed to such an abnormal extent as in all classes in the land of Iran! But, you will ask, how can money be procured or increased fast and without trouble in a country where there is no commercial enterprise, where labour is interfered with, where capital cannot have a free outlet or investment? An opening has to be found in illicit ways of procuring wealth, and the most common form adopted is the loan of money at high interest on ample security. As much as 50 per cent., 80 per cent., 100 per cent. and even more is demanded and obtained as interest on private loans, 15 per cent. being the very lowest and deemed most reasonable indeed! (This does not apply to foreign banks.) All this may seem strange in a Mussulman country, where it is against all the laws of the Koran to lend money at usury, and it is more strange still to find that the principal offenders are the Mullahs themselves, who reap large profits from such illegal financial operations.