long searched for words of hope... Saddened
by the continual strife amongst believers of many confessions and wearied
of their intolerance towards each other, I discovered in the Baha'i
teaching the real spirit of Christ so often denied and misunderstood." And
again, this wonderful confession: "The Baha'i teaching brings peace to the
soul and hope to the heart. To those in search of assurance the words of
the Father are as a fountain in the desert after long wandering."

"The beautiful truth of Baha'u'llah," she wrote to Martha Root, "is with
me always, a help and an inspiration. What I wrote was because my heart
overflowed with gratitude for the reflection you brought me. I am happy if
you think I helped. I thought it might bring truth nearer because my words
are read by so many."

In the course of a visit to the Near East she expressed her intention of
visiting the Baha'i Shrines, and, accompanied by her youngest daughter,
actually passed through Haifa, and was within sight of her goal, when she
was denied the right to make the pilgrimage she had planned--to the keen
disappointment of the aged Greatest Holy Leaf who had eagerly expected her
arrival. A few months later, in June, 1931, she wrote in the course of a
letter to Martha Root: "Both Ileana and I were cruelly disappointed at
having been prevented going to the holy Shrines ... but at that time we
were going through a cruel crisis, and every movement I made was being
turned against me and being politically exploited in an unkind way. It
caused me a good deal of suffering and curtailed my liberty most
unkindly... But the beauty of truth remains, and I cling to it through all
the vicissitudes of a life become rather sad... I am glad to hear that
your traveling has been so fruitful, and I wish you continual success
knowing what a beautiful Message you are carrying from land to land."

After this sad disappointment she wrote to a friend of her childhood who
dwelt near Akka, in a house formerly occupied by Baha'u'llah: "It was
indeed nice to hear from you, and to think that you are of all things
living near Haifa and are, as I am, a follower of the Baha'i teachings. It
interests me that you are living in that special house... I was so
intensely interested and studied each photo intently. It must be a lovely
place ... and the house you live in, so incredibly attractive and made
precious by its associations with the Man we all venerate..."

Her last public tribute to