he mosque at Woking--such scenes as
these, even in the cold record of the printed page, must still have much
of their original impressiveness and power.

Who knows what thoughts flooded the heart of 'Abdu'l-Baha as He found
Himself the central figure of such memorable scenes as these? Who knows
what thoughts were uppermost in His mind as He sat at breakfast beside the
Lord Mayor of London, or was received with extraordinary deference by the
Khedive himself in his palace, or as He listened to the cries of
"Allah-u-Abha" and to the hymns of thanksgiving and praise that would
herald His approach to the numerous and brilliant assemblages of His
enthusiastic followers and friends organized in so many cities of the
American continent? Who knows what memories stirred within Him as He stood
before the thundering waters of Niagara, breathing the free air of a far
distant land, or gazed, in the course of a brief and much-needed rest,
upon the green woods and countryside in Glenwood Springs, or moved with a
retinue of Oriental believers along the paths of the Trocadero gardens in
Paris, or walked alone in the evening beside the majestic Hudson on
Riverside Drive in New York, or as He paced the terrace of the Hotel du
Parc at Thonon-les-Bains, overlooking the Lake of Geneva, or as He watched
from Serpentine Bridge in London the pearly chain of lights beneath the
trees stretching as far as the eye could see? Memories of the sorrows, the
poverty, the overhanging doom of His earlier years; memories of His mother
who sold her gold buttons to provide Him, His brother and His sister with
sustenance, and who was forced, in her darkest hours, to place a handful
of dry flour in the palm of His hand to appease His hunger; of His own
childhood when pursued and derided by a mob of ruffians in the streets of
Tihran; of the damp and gloomy room, formerly a morgue, which He occupied
in the barracks of Akka and of His imprisonment in the dungeon of that
city--memories such as these must surely have thronged His mind. Thoughts,
too, must have visited Him of the Bab's captivity in the mountain
fastnesses of A_dh_irbayjan, when at night time He was refused even a
lamp, and of His cruel and tragic execution when hundreds of bullets
riddled His youthful breast. Above all His thoughts must have centered on
Baha'u'llah, Whom He loved so passionately and Whose trials He had
witnessed and had shared from His boyhood. The vermin-infested
Siyah-_Ch_al of Tihr