oldment of a Faith which they have
served so well and love so dearly. Accounts pathetic and inspiring in
their tone are being received from that steadfast and cheerful band of
exultant believers, and are being shared with the resident friends in the
Holy Land who, having had the privilege of close and continued association
with the person of 'Abdu'l-Baha, cannot but marvel at the range, the
potency and accuracy of the prophecies of their departed Master.

From Turkey, on whose soil, for well nigh three score years and ten, were
enacted some of the sublimest and most tragic scenes in the annals of the
Cause; Turkey, under whose rule Baha'u'llah twice proclaimed Himself, was
thrice exiled and banished, and finally ascended to the Abha Kingdom, and
where 'Abdu'l-Baha spent more than fifty years of His Life, in
incarceration and suffering; has of late been rudely awakened to a Call
which it has so long obstinately despised and ignored. Following on the
overthrow of that effete theocracy, resting on the twin institutions of
the Caliphate and Sultanate--those two sinister forces that have combined
to inflict the deadliest blows to our beloved Faith in the earliest stages
of its infancy and growth--an uncompromising policy aiming at the
secularisation of the State and the disestablishment of Islam was
initiated and carried out with exemplary vigour. Religious institutions
and monastic orders which under the guise of religious propaganda were
converted into hotbeds of political intrigue and sedition were
peremptorily closed, their adherents scattered and banished, their funds
confiscated, their privileges and prerogatives abolished. None, save the
little band of Baha'u'llah's devoted followers, escaped the trenchant axe
of the pitiless reformer; all, without fear or favour, had to submit to
his searching investigations, his dictatorial edicts, his severe and
irrevocable judgment. Lately, however, the Turkish Government, faithful to
its policy of ceaseless vigilance, and fearful of the growing activities
of the Baha'is under its rule, decided to order the Police in the town of
Smyrna to conduct a close investigation into the purpose, the character
and the effects of Baha'i activity in that town. No sooner were the
representative Baha'is in that locality arrested and conducted to the Law
Courts for purposes of investigation, than the President of the Baha'i
Spiritual Assembly of Constantinople who, having read in the morning
paper