The process whereby the effulgence of so dazzling a Revelation was unfolded to the eyes of men was of necessity slow and gradual. The first intimation which its Bearer received did not synchronize with, nor was it followed immediately by, a disclosure of its character to either His own companions or His kindred. A period of no less than ten years had to elapse ere its far-reaching implications could be directly divulged to even those who had been intimately associated with Him—a period of great spiritual ferment, during which the Recipient of so weighty a Message restlessly anticipated the hour at which He could unburden His heavily laden soul, so replete with the potent energies released by God’s nascent Revelation. All He did, in the course of this pre-ordained interval, was to hint, in veiled and allegorical language, in epistles, commentaries, prayers and treatises, which He was moved to reveal, that the Báb’s promise had already been fulfilled, and that He Himself was the One Who had been chosen to redeem it. A few of His fellow-disciples, distinguished by their sagacity, and their personal attachment and devotion to Him, perceived the radiance of the as yet unrevealed glory that had flooded His soul, and would have, but for His restraining influence, divulged His secret and proclaimed it far and wide. Chapter VII: Bahá’u’lláh’s Banishment to ‘Iráq The attempt on the life of Náṣiri’d-Dín _Sh_áh, as stated in a previous chapter, was made on the 28th of the month of _Sh_avval, 1268 A.H., corresponding to the 15th of August, 1852. Immediately after, Bahá’u’lláh was arrested in Níyávarán, was conducted with the greatest ignominy to Ṭihrán and cast into the Síyáh-_Ch_ál. His imprisonment lasted for a period of no less than four months, in the middle of which the “year nine” (1269), anticipated in such glowing terms by the Báb, and alluded to as the year “after Ḥin” by _Sh_ay_kh_ Aḥmad-i-Ahsá’í, was ushered in, endowing with undreamt-of potentialities the whole world. Two months after that year was born, Bahá’u’lláh, the purpose of His imprisonment now accomplished, was released from His confinement, and set out, a month later, for Ba_gh_dád, on the first stage of a memorable and life-long exile which was to carry Him, in the course of years, as far as Adrianople in European Turkey, and which was to end with His twenty-four years’ incarceration in Akká.