ominee of the Bab,
and recognized chief of the Babi community, brought in its wake a period
of travail which left its mark on the fortunes of the Faith for no less
than half a century. This supreme crisis Baha'u'llah Himself designated as
the Ayyam-i-_Sh_idad (Days of Stress), during which "the most grievous
veil" was torn asunder, and the "most great separation" was irrevocably
effected. It immensely gratified and emboldened its external enemies, both
civil and ecclesiastical, played into their hands, and evoked their
unconcealed derision. It perplexed and confused the friends and supporters
of Baha'u'llah, and seriously damaged the prestige of the Faith in the
eyes of its western admirers. It had been brewing ever since the early
days of Baha'u'llah's sojourn in Ba_gh_dad, was temporarily suppressed by
the creative forces which, under His as yet unproclaimed leadership,
reanimated a disintegrating community, and finally broke out, in all its
violence, in the years immediately preceding the proclamation of His
Message. It brought incalculable sorrow to Baha'u'llah, visibly aged Him,
and inflicted, through its repercussions, the heaviest blow ever sustained
by Him in His lifetime. It was engineered throughout by the tortuous
intrigues and incessant machinations of that same diabolical Siyyid
Muhammad, that vile whisperer who, disregarding Baha'u'llah's advice, had
insisted on accompanying Him to Constantinople and Adrianople, and was now
redoubling his efforts, with unrelaxing vigilance, to bring it to a head.

Mirza Yahya had, ever since the return of Baha'u'llah from Sulaymaniyyih,
either chosen to maintain himself in an inglorious seclusion in his own
house, or had withdrawn, whenever danger threatened, to such places of
safety as Hillih and Basra. To the latter town he had fled, disguised as a
Ba_gh_dad Jew, and become a shoe merchant. So great was his terror that he
is reported to have said on one occasion: "Whoever claims to have seen me,
or to have heard my voice, I pronounce an infidel." On being informed of
Baha'u'llah's impending departure for Constantinople, he at first hid
himself in the garden of Huvaydar, in the vicinity of Ba_gh_dad,
meditating meanwhile on the advisability of fleeing either to Abyssinia,
India or some other country. Refusing to heed Baha'u'llah's advice to
proceed to Persia, and there disseminate the writings of the Bab, he sent
a certain Haji Muhammad Kazim, who resembled him, to the gove