Studies in a Mosque - The Search For Mecca

THE PERSIAN MIRACLE PLAY. 231
Faitliful, give ear! and open your hearts to the wrongs and
sufferings of his Highness the Imam 'Ali, the vicegerent of the
Prophet, and let your eyes flow with tears, as a river, for the
woes that befel their Highnesses the beloved Imams Hasan and
Hoseyn, the foremost of the bright youths of Paradise."
For a while he proceeds amid the deep silence of the eager
audience, but as he goes on, they will be observed to be swaying
to and fro, and all together ; at first almost imperceptibly, but
gradually with a motion that becomes more and more marked.
Suddenly a stifled sob is heard, or a cry, followed by more and
more sobbing and crying, and rapidly the swaying to and fro
becomes a violent agitation of the whole assembly, which rises in
a mass, everyone smiting his breast with open hand, and raising
the wild, rhythmical wail of Ya Ali ! Ay Hasan ! Ay Hoseyn
Ay Hasan ! Ay Hoseyn ! Hoseyn SMh ! As the wailing gathers
force, and threatens to become ungovernable, a chorus of mourners
which has formed almost without observation on the arena, begins
chanting, in regular Gregorian music, a metrical version of the
story, which calls back the audience from themselves, and imperceptibly
at last soothes and quiets them again. At the same
time the celebrants come forward, and take up the " properties
before the tabtlt, and one represents Hoseyn, another El-'Abbas,
his brother and standard-bearer, another El-Hurr, and another
Shemmar, all going through their parts (which it seems to be the
duty of the chorus every now and then more fully to explain),
not after the manner of actors, but of earnest men, absorbed in
some high sacrament, without consciousness of themselves or of
their audience.
The ten days' performances {tcCzlyas) ought to
represent severally the events of each of the ten
days of the original history; but it is doubtful
whether this is ever strictly carried out in India. It
is certain that the arrangement of the play, like the
form and decoration of the theatre, and the manner
of the performance, varies greatly in different parts of
the East. The first day should properly describe
the departure of Hoseyn, against the entreaties of
" !