purchased in his childhood as a slave, had been brought up a Musulman, and reduced to his unhappy condition. Like many of his kind, he was employed when young in the public service, and had by his remarkable abilities risen to the highest posts. He had for many years enjoyed the confidence and the favour of the Shah. Considered the best administrator in the kingdom, he had been sent to govern the great province of Isfahan, which included within its limits the wild and lawless tribes of the Lurs and Bakhtiyari, generally in rebellion, and the semi-independent Arab population of the plains between the Luristan Mountains and the Euphrates. He was hated and feared for his cruelty, but it was generally admitted that he ruled justly, that he protected the weak from oppression by the strong, and that where he was able to enforce his authority life and property were secure.[2]
Layard established a close friendship with Muḥammad-Taqí Khán, the chieftain of the Chahár-Lang section of the Bakhtíyárís. Manúchihr Khán captured this chieftain, after lengthy manoeuvres, and sent him with his family to Ṭihrán, where he died. Chiefly for that reason Layard is not at all complimentary in his copious writings about Manúchihr Khán. There is no doubt that the Bakhtíyárí chieftain was in rebellion against the central government and even intended to take himself and his territory out of its jurisdiction. The proof is afforded by the fact that he sent Henry Layard to the island of Khárg, then occupied by British forces, to sound the British authorities for support. Hennell told Layard that although Britain was in a state bordering on war with Írán, she would not countenance or encourage insurrection or secession.
Disregarding Layard's prejudices, the fact remains that historical evidence exists in plenty to prove that Manúchihr Khán had, in the company of his peers, his ample share of avarice and cruelty. He had been a faithful servant of Muḥammad Sháh, had fought battles for him to make his throne secure, and had, in successive appointments, pacified a vast area of the country, stretching from Kirmánsháh in the west to Iṣfahán in the central regions, and to the waters of the Persian Gulf in the south. When he served as the Vizier of the province of Fárs, he put down an uprising, brought some seventy to eighty prisoners with him to Shíráz, and outside the gate of Bágh-i-Sháh had a tower erected with their living bodies, which was held firm by mortar.
The Báb, as He approached Iṣfahán, wrote a letter to Manúchihr Khán in which he asked for shelter. Siyyid Káẓim-i-Zanjání took the letter to the Governor, who, greatly impressed by it, sent it on to Siyyid Muḥammad, the Sulṭánu'l-`Ulamá, the Imám-Jum`ih of Iṣfahán, and requested that high dignitary to open his home to the Báb. The Imám-Jum`ih dispatched a number of people close to himself, amongst them his brother,[CP] some distance out of the city to escort the Báb to Iṣfahán, and at the city-limits he himself welcomed the Visitor with respect and reverence. He went far beyond the usual marks of cordial hospitality, even to the extent of pouring water from a ewer over the hands of the Báb, a task normally performed by attendants.
There were, by this time, an appreciable number of Bábís in Iṣfahán, many of them natives of the city and some directed there by the Báb Himself. Amongst the wider public the fame of the Báb spread rapidly. There was one occasion when people came to take away the water He had used for His ablutions, so greatly did they value it. His host was enthralled by the Báb. One night, after the evening meal, he asked his Guest to write for him a commentary on the Súrih of V'al-`Aṣr (Afternoon—Qur'án ciii), one of the shortest Súrihs:
By the afternoon!
Surely Man is in the way of loss,
save those who believe, and do righteous deeds,
and counsel each other unto the truth,
and counsel each other to be steadfast.[3]
The Báb took up His pen and wrote His commentary, there and then, to the astonishment and delight of all who were present. It was past midnight when the assemblage broke up. Mullá Muḥammad-Taqíy-i-Hirátí, one of the divines of Iṣfahán, was so overcome by the power of the Báb's pen and voice that he said with great feeling:
Peerless and unique as are the words which have streamed from this pen, to be able to reveal, within so short a time and in so legible a writing, so great a number of verses as to equal a fourth, nay a third, of the Qur'án, is in itself an achievement such as no mortal, without the intervention of God, could hope to perform.[4]
People of all ranks flocked to the house of the Imám-Jum`ih. Manúchihr Khán himself called there to meet the Báb. He was a proud man and a powerful Governor, ruling over an important section of the realm. His visit to a young Siyyid, hitherto unknown, indicates the measure of change wrought in him by that one letter which he had received from the Báb. Indeed, Manúchihr Khán was to become a changed man under the influence of the Báb, who had been a fugitive and an exile at his door. He now asked the Báb for a treatise on 'Nubuvvat-i-Kháṣṣih'—the specific station and mission of the Prophet Muḥammad. Again surrounded by a number of the leading divines of Iṣfahán, the Báb wrote instantaneously the treatise which the Governor desired. Within two hours He produced a disquisition of fifty pages, superbly reasoned, proving unassailably the claim and the achievement of Islám, and ending His theme on the subject of the advent of the Qá'im and the Return of Imám Ḥusayn (Rij`at-i-Ḥusayní). Manúchihr Khán's immediate response was:
Hear me! Members of this revered assembly, I take you as my witnesses. Never until this day have I in my heart been firmly convinced of the truth of Islám. I can henceforth, thanks to this exposition penned by this Youth, declare myself a firm believer in the Faith proclaimed by the Apostle of God. I solemnly testify to my belief in the reality of the superhuman power with which this Youth is endowed, a power which no amount of learning can ever impart.[5]