e clergy, whose ornaments vied
with the treasures of the palaces of kings, are either forsaken or fallen
in ruin. Their takyihs, the haunts of the lazy, the passive, and
contemplative pietists, are either being sold or closed down. Their
ta'ziyihs (religious plays), acted with barbaric zeal, and accentuated by
sudden spasms of unbridled religious excitement, are forbidden. Even their
rawdih-_kh_anis (lamentations), with their long-drawn-out, plaintive
howls, which arose from so many houses, have been curtailed and
discouraged. The sacred pilgrimages to Najaf and Karbila, the holiest
shrines of the _Sh_i'ih world, are reduced in number and made increasingly
difficult, preventing thereby many a greedy mulla from indulging in his
time-honored habit of charging double for making those pilgrimages as a
substitute for the religious-minded. The disuse of the veil which the
mullas fought tooth and nail to prevent; the equality of sexes which their
law forbade; the erection of civil tribunals which superseded their
ecclesiastical courts; the abolition of the si_gh_ih (concubinage) which,
when contracted for short periods, is hardly distinguishable from
quasi-prostitution, and which made of the turbulent and fanatical
Ma_sh_had, the national center of pilgrimage, one of the most immoral
cities in Asia; and finally, the efforts which are being made to disparage
the Arabic tongue, the sacred language of Islam and of the Qur'an, and to
divorce it from Persian--all these have successively lent their share to
the acceleration of that impelling process which has subordinated to the
civil authority the position and interests of Muslim clericals to a degree
undreamt of by any mulla.

Well might the once lofty-turbaned, long-bearded, grave-looking aqa
(mulla), who had so insolently concerned himself with every department of
human activity, as he sits, hatless, clean shaven, in the seclusion of his
home, and perhaps listening to the strains of western music, blared upon
the ethers of his native land, pause to reflect for a while on the
vanished splendors of his defunct empire. Well might he muse upon the
havoc which the rising tide of nationalism and skepticism has wrought in
the adamantine traditions of his country. Well might he recollect the
halcyon days when, seated on a donkey, and parading through the bazars and
maydans of his native town, an eager but deluded multitude would rush to
kiss with fervor not only his hands, but also the t