each one asked
himself, "How can the Law be abrogated? How is it that this woman stands
here without her veil?"

"Read the Surih of the Inevitable,"(129) said Baha'u'llah; and the reader
began: "When the Day that must come shall have come suddenly... Day that
shall abase! Day that shall exalt!..." and thus was the new Dispensation
announced and the great Resurrection made manifest. At the start, those
who were present fled away, and some forsook their Faith, while some fell
a prey to suspicion and doubt, and a number, after wavering, returned to
the presence of Baha'u'llah. The Conference of Bada_sh_t broke up, but the
universal Advent had been proclaimed.

Afterward, Quddus hastened away to the Fort of Tabarsi(130) and the
Blessed Beauty, with provisions and equipment, journeyed to Niyala, having
the intention of going on from there by night, making His way through the
enemy encampment and entering the Fort. But Mirza Taqi, the Governor of
Amul, got word of this, and with seven hundred riflemen arrived in Niyala.
Surrounding the village by night, he sent Baha'u'llah with eleven riders
back to Amul, and those calamities and tribulations, told of before, came
to pass.

As for Tahirih, after the breakup at Bada_sh_t she was captured, and the
oppressors sent her back under guard to Tihran. There she was imprisoned
in the house of Mahmud _Kh_an, the Kalantar. But she was aflame, enamored,
restless, and could not be still. The ladies of Tihran, on one pretext or
another, crowded to see and listen to her. It happened that there was a
celebration at the Mayor's house for the marriage of his son; a nuptial
banquet was prepared, and the house adorned. The flower of Tihran's ladies
were invited, the princesses, the wives of vazirs and other great. A
splendid wedding it was, with instrumental music and vocal melodies--by day
and night the lute, the bells and songs. Then Tahirih began to speak; and
so bewitched were the great ladies that they forsook the cithern and the
drum and all the pleasures of the wedding feast, to crowd about Tahirih
and listen to the sweet words of her mouth.

Thus she remained, a helpless captive. Then came the attempt on the life
of the _Sh_ah;(131) a farman was issued; she was sentenced to death.
Saying she was summoned to the Prime Minister's, they arrived to lead her
away from the Kalantar's house. She bathed her face and hands, arrayed
herself in a costly dress, and scented with attar of roses she