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Sam Khan the Christian asked to be excused; the turn of service came to another regiment, and the chief of the farrashes withheld his hand. Aqa Jan Big of Khamsih, colonel of the bodyguard, advanced; and they again bound the Bab together with that young man to the same nail. The Bab uttered certain words which those few who knew Persian understood, while the rest heard but the sound of His voice. (27:1) The colonel of the regiment appeared in person: and it was before noon on the twenty-eighth day of Sha'ban in the year (A.H.) one thousand two hundred and sixty-six. Suddenly he gave orders to fire. At this volley the bullets produced such an effect that the breasts (of the victims) were riddled, and their limbs were completely dissected, except their faces, which were but little marred. (27:2) Then they removed those two bodies from the square to the edge of the moat outside the city, and that night they remained by the edge of the moat. Next day the Russian consul came with an artist and took a picture of those two bodies in the posture wherein they had fallen at the edge of the moat. (27:3) On the second night at midnight the Babis carried away the two bodies. (27:4) On the third day the people did not find the bodies, and some supposed that the wild beasts had devoured them, so that the doctors proclaimed from the summits of their pulpits saying, "The holy body of the immaculate Imam and that of the true Shi'ite are preserved from the encroachments of beasts of prey and creeping things and wounds, but the body of this person have the wild beasts torn in pieces." But after the fullest investigation and inquiry it hath been proved that when the Bab had dispersed all His writings and personal properties and it had become clear and evident from various signs that these events would shortly take place, therefore, on the second day of these events, Sulayman Khan the son of Yahya Khan, one of the nobles of Adhirbayjan devoted to the Bab, arrived, and proceeded straightway to the house of the mayor of Tabriz. And since the mayor was an old friend, associate, and confidant of his; since, moreover, he was of the mystic temperament and did not entertain aversion or dislike for any sect, Sulayman Khan divulged this secret to him saying, "Tonight I, with several others, will endeavor by every means and artifice to rescue the body. Even though it be not possible, come what may we will make an attack, and either attain our object or pour out our lives freely in this way." "Such troubles," answered the mayor, "are in no wise necessary." He then sent one of his private servants named Haji Allah-Yar, who, by whatever means and proceedings it was, obtained the body without trouble or difficulty and handed it over to Haji Sulayman Khan. And when it was morning the sentinels, to excuse themselves, said that the wild beasts had devoured it. That night they sheltered the body in the workshop of a Babi of Milan: next day they manufactured a box, placed it in the box, and left it as a trust. Afterwards, in accordance with instructions which arrived from Tihran, they sent it away from Adhirbayjan. And this transaction remained absolutely secret.
(27:5)
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