erful impression on Jalaluddin, so that he
plied Shams-i-Tabriz with questions and resorted with him to lonely
desert places for uninterrupted converse. This led to a neglect of
teaching on his part, and his pupils and adherents persecuted and
ridiculed Shams-i-Tabriz, calling him "a bare-footed and bare-headed
fakir, who has come hither to lead the pattern of believers astray."
Their treatment caused Shams-i-Tabriz to flee to his native city without
telling Jalaluddin. The latter, however, overcome by love and longing,
went after him, found him and persuaded him to return.

Shams-i-Tabriz did so, and for some time longer they lived in friendly
intercourse together; but Jalaluddin's disciples again began to
persecute the former, who departed to Syria, where he remained two
years. During this interval, in order to soften the pain of separation,
Jalaluddin instituted mystical dances, which he ordered to be
accompanied by the flute. This was the beginning of the celebrated order
of Mevlevis, or dancing dervishes, which has now existed for over six
hundred years, successively presided over by descendants of Jalaluddin.
Their gyrations are intended to symbolise the wheelings of the planets
round their central sun and the attraction of the creature to the
Creator. They exist in large numbers in Turkey, and to this day the
coronation of the Sultan of Turkey is not considered complete till he
is girded with a sword by the head dervish of the Mevlevi order.

Shams-i-Tabriz subsequently returned to Konia and perished there in a
tumult, the details of which are not known. To commemorate his friend
Jalaluddin composed his "Diwan-i-Shams-i-Tabriz," putting the latter's
name in place of his own as the author. It is a collection of spirited
odes setting forth the doctrines of Sufistic Pantheism. The following
lines on pilgrimage to the Kaaba afford a good instance of the way in
which the Sufi poets endeavour to spiritualise the rites of Islam:--

Beats there a heart within that breast of thine,
Then compass reverently its sacred shrine:
For the essential Kaaba is the heart,
And no proud pile of perishable art.

When God ordained the pilgrim rite, that sign
Was meant to lead thy thoughts to things divine;
A thousand times _he_ treads that round in vain
Who gives one human heart a needless pain.

Leave wealth behind; bring God thy heart, Whose light
Will guide thy footsteps through the gloomiest night