[Footnote DM: The present writer heard this account from Valíyu'lláh Varqá, the son of the martyr-poet, who had the rank of a Hand of the Cause by appointment of the Guardian of the Bahá'í Faith.] The Báb must have reached Tabríz in the last week of July 1848. Muḥammad [_Sh_]áh's illness was, by then, giving concern to Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí, and the wily old Grand Vizier, conscious of his approaching downfall, was already seeking ways and means of softening the blow. Over the course of years he had grown to be a very rich man, owning villages and farmlands and urban property. He knew that with the death of Muḥammad [_Sh_]áh he would lose not only his position and power, but also his enormous wealth. When Muḥammad [_Sh_]áh was dying, Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí was no longer to be seen within the precincts of the palace, for his powerful enemies in the Court, whom he had not been able to destroy,[DN] were ready to pounce on him. He retired to his village of `Abbásábád. There his body-guard, recruited from his home town of Máh-Kú, disintegrated. The people of Ṭihrán who had suffered so much at their hands now found opportunities to avenge themselves, and Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí found himself in such straits that he felt constrained to write to the boy-prince, `Abbás Mírzá, and a number of prominent courtiers, to plead for harmony and friendship. As no response was forthcoming from these quarters, he put on a bold face and tried to regain his residence in Ṭihrán. But the artillery General, who commanded the royal guard at the citadel, let him know that his stay in Ṭihrán was undesirable. So he tried to reach Á[_dh_]arbáyján, the province to which he had exiled the Báb, to take refuge with the inhabitants of his native town. He had not gone far from the capital when he was turned back. Deserted and mocked, he had no course open but to seek sanctuary in the shrine of [_Sh_]áh `Abdu'l-`Aẓím. Such was the end of all power for Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí, the Antichrist of the Bábí Revelation. [Footnote DN: They included men such as Mírzá Yúsuf, the Mustawfíu'l-Mamálik and `Abbás-Qulí [_Kh_]án-i-Javán[_sh_]ír.]