Hajee Seid Kausem one of the Chief Priests of Kerbella died lately on his return from a visit to Samerrah--Seid Ibrahim Kasveenee the other Chief Priest who was greatly opposed to him, will now enjoy full power, and all contention between the two religious parties will cease.[7] When Mullá Ḥusayn-i-Bu[_sh_]rú'í returned to Karbilá from his highly successful mission in Írán, his teacher was dead. He had not appointed anyone to succeed him. II To follow the events of this narrative, it may be helpful to consider their background in some aspects of Iranian history.[G] [Footnote G: For other aspects the reader is referred to the Introduction of Nabíl's _The Dawn-Breakers_.] Muḥammad [_Sh_]áh, the third monarch of the Qájár dynasty, ruled the land in 1843, but real power rested in the hands of Ḥájí Mírzá Áqásí, his unprepossessing Grand Vizier. The Qájárs were a tribe of Turkish origin. Áqá Muḥammad [_Kh_]án, a eunuch chieftain of this tribe, arose in the year 1779 to carve out a kingdom for himself. Fifteen years later he finally won the crown of Írán when he captured and brutally murdered Luṭf-`Alí [_Kh_]án, the last ruler of the Zand dynasty, who was brave and high-minded but piteously young. The eunuch king was utterly and savagely ruthless, and he managed to hold off the Russians in the area of the Caucasus until 1797 when he was struck down by three assassins. He was succeeded by his nephew, Fatḥ-`Alí [_Sh_]áh, a man of soft heart and weak will, who was highly uxorious. At his death in 1834, fifty-three sons and forty-six daughters survived him. During the reign of Fatḥ-`Alí [_Sh_]áh, Írán lost heavily to Russia in a series of disastrous wars. Her ministers, comfortably cocooned in their isolation from the currents of world affairs, and totally ignorant of the realities of the European situation, believed that with the aid of the Emperor of France the Russian menace could be thwarted. Hard on the heels of General Gardanne, Bonaparte's envoy, not one but two envoys from the more familiar 'Ingríz' (English) came in 1808. Sir Harford Jones had been dispatched from the court of King George III and Sir John Malcolm from India. In 1801 the latter, on behalf of the Marquis of Wellesley, Governor-General of India, concluded an abortive treaty with the shrewd and immensely ambitious Grand Vizier[H] of Fatḥ-`Alí [_Sh_]áh. But in the intervening years Bonaparte, subsequent to his _débacle_ in Egypt and Syria, showered his dubious favours on the Persians, and the British connexion was conveniently ignored by the ministers of Fatḥ-`Alí [_Sh_]áh, who had entered into the Treaty of Finkenstein (1807) with the French. Moreover, in the same period, the most capable Ḥájí Ibráhím [_Kh_]án, who had contributed more than anyone to the downfall of the Zand dynasty and the ensuing victories of the eunuch king, fell from power and, as legend has it, met his death in a boiling cauldron.