Branch of God," a telegram was received from the Sultan to the Governor "issuing a firman, decreeing the original order, by which Baha's family were confined within the walls of Acca." After _nine_ years of quarrelling (_nine_ being the sacred number of Bahais) this order was put in force, 1901 A.D. They were still confined to Acca in 1906 when I visited Haifa. I saw the shrine and the fine residence of Baha at Haifa, just beside the English Mission. It deserves to be emphasized that the _cause of the Bahai leaders being restricted to Acca_ was not religious persecution by Moslems but _their own quarrellings_. So completely had the suspicions of Abdul Hamid's government been aroused by their accusations against each other that the death sentence was feared. Pilgrimages were stopped and terror rested on the followers.[594] Abdul Baha wrote to his American disciples of these conditions in the following hyperbolic words: "Verily, by God, I would not change this prison for the throne nor for all the gardens of the earth. Verily I hope to be suspended in the air, and that my breast may become the target to be pierced by thousands of bullets: or that I may be cast into the bottomless seas or thrown into the wilderness.... If I could taste the cup of the great martyrdom, my greatest desire would be fulfilled. This is my utmost aim, the animation of my spirit, the healing of my bosom, the sight of my eyes." But when the establishment of the Constitution in Turkey gave him freedom, he was quick to take advantage of it. He went to Egypt and took up his residence there.[595] The history I have narrated above refutes these various pretensions of Bahaism, its claims, its "great swelling words" more forcibly than logic or the judgments and opinions of myself and others. The conduct of Abdul Baha and his followers towards the brothers and their followers, as well as that of Bahais to the Azalis, contradicts their fine professions of toleration and love to all religions and all men. Well may we exclaim with Professor Browne: "Where is the restraining power, when they can show such _bitter animosity_ against those of their own household!" The numbers of Bahais living at Acca then was about ninety,[596] and of them thirty[597] or forty[598] were of the opponents of Abbas.