with all your strength to inform both the lawyers here, and by telegraph our friends in Istanbul, and Hulûsi in Ankara that my life is in danger. I can no longer endure it, due to being poisoned as part of a conspiracy, and illness, and old age, and solitary confinement, and even being forbidden to look at or speak with whoever brings my food to the hatch. And now for the third time was yesterday's incident, a plot. On visiting day, Ceylan is to inform Zübeyir of this and my pitiful condition, and let him do whatever is possible. In my opinion those two men are trying on account of the Masons to force me into making a muddle of things. It is essential in the name of the law to attempt to make the Appeal Court deliver us, in the name of the country and nation, from their extreme oppression and injustice. [^315]

[^315]:Şahiner, Son Şahitler, i, 24.

In his account of Afyon, İbrahim Fakazlı mentions Bediuzzaman's pitiful condition either on this or a similar occasion and goes on to describe the extreme cold, and how the prison authorities finally moved Bediuzzaman temporarily to another, crowded, ward:

If we didn't see Ustad at the window, we would be very worried and wonder the reason. Whatever the price, we would find an opportunity to go up to him and see. One bitterly cold winter's day, I slipped up to him [secretly] without being seen. Ustad was very ill. He stretched out his hand to me and told me to take it. I took it and kissed it. It was burning and he could not stand the heat of my hand. He said: "İbrahim, I am extremely ill. I'm about to die. But I feel comforted since you're here." At that point Ceylan came. He repeated the same things to him. We wept in bewilderment. Ustad was weeping as well. We were completely at a loss what to do. He embraced both of us and bade us farewell, then he recited a lot of prayers for us and sent us away. On returning to the ward, we explained the situation to the brothers, and we recited a lot of prayers and read Jaushan. [^316] Later we realized that Ustad had been poisoned.

[^316]:The Jaushan al-Kabîr is the famous supplication revealed to the Prophet Muhammed (PBUH) which, comprising the divine names, is said to possess many merits.

It was winter. Everywhere in Afyon was frozen and communications were cut with its surroundings. The railway was closed. For fifteen to twenty days no food or fuel could reach the town, and there was no running water. It wasn't possible to heat Bediuzzaman's ward with its broken windows and gaping floor-boards. That day, I saw Hazret-i Ustad under two blankets double-folded with an oil-can in front of him in which was a little bit of charcoal and a kettle and tea-pot.

While the innocent, elderly, and ill Bediuzzaman was freezing to death in his empty ward virtually open to the elements, the ward opposite was in