and the Rev. Geo. Bush; also to the travels of Burckhardt, Joseph Pitts,
Ludovico Bartema and Giovanni Finati, each of whom undertook a
pilgrimage to the cities of Medina and Mecca; also to the excellent
synopsis of the life and times of Mohammed as given by Prof. Max Müller
in the introduction to Palmer's translation of the Koran.

As the tiny pebble cast into the water sends its circling wavelets to
the distant shore, so this little book is cast forth upon the world, in
the hope that it may exert some influence in bringing hope and comfort
to some weary heart, and that, in helping someone to attain a clearer
conception of Divine love and companionship, it may, if in never so
insignificant a degree, perhaps help on to that time when all shall

"Trust the Hand of Light will lead the people,
Till the thunders pass, the spectres vanish,
And the Light is Victor, and the darkness
Dawns into the Jubilee of the Ages."




PRECEDING EVENTS--SUMMARY.


Yusuf, a Guebre priest, a man of intensely religious temperament, and
one of those whose duty it is to keep alive the sacred fire of the
Persian temple, has long sought for a more heart-satisfying religion
than that afforded to him by the doctrines of his country. Though a man
of kindliest disposition, yet so benighted he is that, led on by a deep
study of the mysteries of Magian and Sabæan rites, he has been induced