s the report of the Smyrna incident, had resolved unsummoned to offer
the necessary explanations to the authorities concerned, was in his turn
arrested and taken to the Police Headquarters where he soon afterwards was
joined by the other members of the Assembly. The official searching of
their homes, the seizure of whatever Baha'i literature they had in their
possession, their twenty-four hours' detention at the Police station, the
searching severity of the cross-examination to which they were
subjected--all proved powerless to alarm and shake the faith of those
intrepid champions of the Cause, or to evince anything detrimental to the
best interests of the State. On the contrary, they served to deeply
impress upon the minds and hearts of the officials concerned the
sublimity, the innocence, and the dynamic force of the Faith of
Baha'u'llah. So much so that their books were returned, a genuine desire
to deepen their knowledge of the Cause was expressed by their examiners,
and widespread publicity, as reflected in the articles of about a dozen
leading newspapers of Turkey, was accorded by the Government, proclaiming
the innocence of the Cause and lifting up the ban that now so oppressively
weighs upon religious institutions in Turkey.

From Constantinople in European Turkey to the eastern confines of
Anatolia, on the banks of the river Euphrates, where a small and
flourishing Baha'i Community has been recently established, a wave of
public interest, criticism and inquiry has been sweeping over the surface
of the land, as witnessed by the character and number of the leading
articles, the illustrations and caricatures that have appeared in the most
prominent newspapers of the capital and the provincial towns of Asiatic
Turkey. Not only Turkey, but its neighbouring countries of the East and
the West, have lifted up their voice in the vindication of the Baha'i
truth. From information thus far gathered we learn that in Hungary, in
'Iraq, Egypt and Syria, and as far west as France and England, newspapers
have, of their own accord, with varying degree of accuracy, and in more or
less detail, reported this incident in their columns, and have given,
unasked and unaware, such publicity to our beloved Faith which no campaign
of teaching, however elaborately organised by the believers themselves,
could ever hope to achieve at the present time. Surely the invincible arm
of Baha'u'llah, working through strange and mysterious ways, will c