Page:The Post Office of India and its story.djvu/150

120 Dibdin, managed to land at Tor near the mouth of the Gulf of Suez, to make his way across Egypt and finally to reach his destination. Not so Mr. Eyles Irwin, the messenger of the Governor. He sailed in the brig Adventure, and after many mishaps only succeeded in reaching Cosseir on the Red Sea in July, where he and his companions were detained by the Turks.

In 1778, after the fall of Pondicherry, Warren Hastings was determined that the good news should go home via Suez, and he engaged to send Mr. Greuber by a fast sailing packet to that port with the despatches. The proposal was strenuously opposed by Francis and Wheler, but Hastings, having Barwell on his side and a casting vote in Council, was able to carry out his intention. Mr. Greuber managed to get through by this route, but neither Hastings nor the Board of Directors anticipated the objections which the Ottoman Porte had to any navigation of the Red Sea by the Company's ships. In 1779 the Porte issued a firman putting a stop to all trade between Egypt and India by the way of Suez and decreed that ships from India could proceed only as far as Jeddah. If despatches were to be sent by Suez, the messenger conveying them had to travel from Jeddah by Turkish ship. This was a hopeless arrangement and meant endless delay, besides which the fate of messengers or of any Europeans crossing the desert between Suez and Cairo was very uncertain. The terrible dangers and difficulties of the journey are graphically described in Mrs. Fay's letters. Owing to the opposition of the Turkish Government the overland route was abandoned for some time, but in 1797 an arrangement was made with them and the company's cruiser Panther, under the command of Captain Speak, sailed in that year with despatches. She left Bombay on