WITH THE DEVOTEES

It took quite a long time for the news of the Mother’s misery at Kamarpukur to percolate to the Calcutta devotees. The young monks were then travelling here and there impelled by the desire for a life of absolute surrender to Providence; they, therefore, knew nothing of this. Swami Saradananda said afterwards, ‘We could not then imagine that the Mother could not even get a pinch of salt.’ After eight or nine months, when the devotees learnt the true state of affairs, they finalized their plan to accommodate her in Calcutta and then transmitted their request to her. The Mother knew what was in the hearts of the devotees. She was aware of the irrationality of rejecting the call of such loving followers and continuing in the adverse atmosphere of Kamarpukur. Yet she could not make up her mind without considering fully a few intricate questions. The Master had reminded her off and on that modesty is the highest virtue of a woman. Would she be able to maintain her habitual seclusion in the new surroundings?

The second question was more serious, or rather it was the first question in a more complicated setting. Her travels between Jayrambati and Dakshineswar were nothing uncommon from the social point of view, so long as the Master was there. But now that he was no more, could the Mother proceed to Calcutta overriding the prejudices and narrow notions of village folk? The Mother herself related how the problem was solved: When my coming here (Calcutta) was being talked of, after the Master’s passing away, I was at Kamarpukur. Many there said, “Good heavens! They are young boys, how can you possibly live with them?” I knew in my heart, of course, that I would live here. Still one has to take account of public opinion; and so I consulted many. Some again, said, “Why, of course, you should go; they are all disciples.” I simply listened to all that they said. Now, there is an old widow (Prasannamayi) in our village whose opinion is respected because she is very virtuous and intelligent. I went to her at last and asked, “What do you say?” She replied, “Fancy! You will certainly go. They are disciples, as good as your sons. How can such a question arise? There can be no two opinions about your going.” Hearing of this, others also consented. Then I came.’

Sometime in May, 1888, the Mother came to Balaram Babu’s house in Calcutta. Either at this time or near about this, we get a profound insight into the inwardness and God-absorption of the Mother. That day, as she sat for meditation on the roof of Balaram Babu’s house, she entered into samadhi. When she emerged from it, she said to Yogin-Ma, ‘I saw, I was in a far-off place. All were treating me there with the utmost love. I became very beautiful. The Master was there, and with great tenderness they made me sit by his side. I can’t describe the bliss that I enjoyed. When I regained my consciousness a little, I saw the body lying here. Then the thought came to me, “How can I enter into this ugly body?” I had not the least desire to resume it. At long last, I managed to get into it; and then consciousness returned to it.’ It appears to us as though the discord between the intrinsic divinity of the Mother and her physical ventures became intensely vivid through that vision, at the same time that she became more fully aware of her real identity and felt that through God’s dispensation she had to work for the good of the world in and through such uninviting environment.

In a few days, the garden house of Nilambar Babu on the Ganges at Belur was engaged by the devotees, and the Holy Mother went there with Yogin-Ma, Golap-Ma, and some monks as her companions and attendants. She stayed there for six months. Her meditativeness was as intense now as before. One day, as she sat in meditation on the roof with her two woman companions, she became merged in deep samadhi, so that her companions, on rising from their seats, found her body stiff and motionless. After a long time she said while descending to the normal plane, ‘O Yogen, where are my hands, where are my feet?’ The companions, while pressing her hands and feet to make her conscious of them, said, ‘Here, indeed, are your hands and here your feet.’ Still it took quite a long time for her to regain normal consciousness. When the term of the lease expired, the Mother returned to Balaram Babu’s house at the beginning of November, 1888, from where she started for Puri after a couple of days.

This pilgrimage attracted quite a number of devotees; and Swamis Brahmananda, Yogananda and Saradananda, as also Yogin-Ma, Golap-Ma, Yogin-Ma’s mother, and Lakshmi Devi went with her. The coastal railroad had not yet been constructed; hence they went by steamer from Calcutta to Chandbali (7th November), from where they proceeded by a launch to Cuttack, and by cart to Puri. Arriving at Puri, they visited Lord Jagannatha immediately, for an inauspicious period would commence from the next day. Then the Holy Mother and the women went to live in a house of Balaram Babu, called the Kshetra-basir Math or a resort for the dwellers in the holy place; the monks had their own separate place. The Mother stayed here for a little more than two months, returning to Calcutta in the middle of January next year. We shall relate here some incidents of the Puri visit.

As the Master had never been to Puri, the Mother carried his picture under her cloth so as to show him Jagannatha by showing the deity to his picture; for she believed that ‘the picture and its prototype were the same.’ About Jagannatha she said, ‘I saw Jagannatha as the best of all persons sitting on an altar of gems with myself serving Him as a handmaid.’ At another time she said that she saw the god as Siva.1 On her visit to the temple, she was delighted to see the great concourse of pilgrims; and with tears of joy she thought within herself, ‘Hey-day! good luck! so many people will be freed (through this vision of the Lord)!’ But the next moment it occurred to to her, ‘No, only those rare few who have no worldly desire will be freed. ’ When she shared her thought with Yogin-Ma, the latter, too, concurred.

At Puri the Mother’s characteristic humility was revealed in bold lelief.

Govinda Shingari, the Panda1 of Balaram Babu’s family, thought that in keeping with the honour of that family a palanquin should be arranged for carrying their guru’s wife to the temple. When he placed this proposal before the Mother, she said ‘No, Govinda, you will walk in front as a guide and I shall follow you as a poor humble woman to visit Jagannatha.’ It was thus that she visited the temple. She also visited all the noted places at Puri, and she spent long hours regularly in meditation at the temple of Lakshmi.

From Puri she returned to Calcutta on the 12 th January, 1889; and the next day, she bathed in the Ganges at Nimtola. She visited the Kali temple at Kalighat on the 22nd. On the 5th February she went with Swamis Vivekananda, Saradananda, Yogananda and Premananda, as also Master Mahashaya, Sannyal Mahashaya and many others to Antpur, the birth-place of Swami Premananda. After spending about a week there, she left for Kamarpukur by a bullock-cart. Master Mahashaya and some others accompanied her.

Her stay at this time at Kamarpukur was almost as long as the first one. Then she came to Calcutta, and took up her residence on the banks of the Ganga at Belur in the rented house of Raju Gomasta. From there she went on the 5th March (1890) to Master Mahashaya’s house at Kambuliatola (Calcutta), from where she went on a pilgrimage to Gaya with the old Swami Advaitananda. After the passing away of his mother, the Master had asked the Holy Mother to go to Gaya to offer oblation at the well-known Vishnu-pada (Footprints of Vishnu). The Mother now carried out that command. She took this opportunity to visit Baidyanatha on the way, and from Gaya she went to Bodh Gaya also. On the completion of this pilgrimage, she returned to Master Mahashaya’s house on the 2nd April.1 Just then Balaram Babu lay gravely ill. The Mother remembered well his services to the Master and the latter’s love for him; and, therefore, she shifted to his house to be at his bed-side during his last days. The great devout soul passed away on the 13th April, 1890.

A month later she moved over to a rented house on the Ganges at Ghushuri (Belur), near the local crematorium. When she was there, an irresistible desire to go out in quest of the Unknown was roused in Swami Vivekananda’s heart, and he decided to leave the monastery and wander about the country for some time in quest of illumination. But he felt strongly inclined to seek the Mother’s blessing before he started. Coming, therefore, to her one day in July, he made a long and reverential prostration, sang to her some devotional songs, and then expressed his heart’s desire: ‘Mother, if I can become a man in the true sense of the term, then only shall I return; otherwise this will be my last farewell.’ Taken aback, the Mother said, ‘You don’t say so!’ The Swami said, ‘No, no, by your grace I shall soon come back.’ The Mother could understand the depth of her son’s aspiration, and to her divine vision appeared clearly the picture of his bright future; hence she blessed him heartily and asked him to return after enlightenment and fulfilment of his mission. Immensely inspired by her good wishes, Swamiji left for a tour of the holy places of India.

The Mother lived in that house till the month of Bhadra (August-September). Then she had to be taken to Saurindra Thakur’s house at Baranagore across the river for treatment for dysentery from which she was suffering. The then Ramakrishna Math was not far from this house, so that it was easier for the monks to arrange for her comfort and medical care. After she became well she went to the house of Balaram Babu, preparatory to her departure for Jayrambati by way of Kamarpukur after the Durga worship (sometime in October). Of the events of her stay there,1 the details available are not very clear, though an account of what happened during the Jagaddhatri worship that year (10th November, 1891) shows clearly that the Mother had then been fully established in her Motherhood, and that her divinity, too, had become acknowledged among intimate acquaintances. At that time Swami Saradananda went to Jayrambati to attend the worship of the deity, and with him went Sannyal Mahashaya, Haramohan Mitra, Kalikrishna (Swami

Virajananda), Golap-Ma, and Yogin-Ma. They reached Burdwan by train and went from there to Kamarpukur by bullock-cart. After they had seen the Master’s birth-place, they covered the rest of the way to Jayrambati on foot. The Mother’s joy knew no bounds at the sight of her beloved children. She was ever busy attending to their needs. Every day she dressed the vegetables and prepared special dishes for them, and then served the food and sat by them to see that they were fully satisfied. Her affection touched the deepest chords of their hearts. She was more particularly attentive to the young novitiate, Kalikrishna, who was still in his teens. She received him as a veritable son and kissed him by touching his chin.1 He ran errands for the elders and had free access everywhere. He had often to go to the inner apartments to fetch betels, tiffin, or fire for their tobacco pipes. As it is not customary to hand over fire directly to a son,2 the Holy Mother placed the burning charcoal or cow-dung cake on the ground for him to pick it up with a pair of tongs.

Shyamasundari Devi was addressed by them as grandmother. She was simple and diligent; there was no end to her daily round of duties. Tending the cattle, feeding the labourers, husking paddy, and such other tasks closely followed one another; and yet she was all smiles for everyone—there was no sign of anger or annoyance. The Mother, also, was always at her side. Grandmother looked upon the devotees as her grandchildren for whose welfare she was extremely solicitous. The call ‘grandma’ pleased her as nothing else. This natural love for the grandchildren continued all through her life; and even those who went to Jayrambati much later had an unforgettable touch of her warm heart. Throughout the year she would be busy laying by things for her grandchildren and declaring, ‘Mine is a family of God and His devotees.’

At that time grandmother narrated many incidents of the Master’s life to her grandchildren Kalikrishna and others. One day Haridas Vairagi, a roving minstrel of Desra, came and sang to the tune of his violin:

What a delightful news it is, O Uma (dear daughter)!

(Dear me)! I hear from people —say if that is true, O Siva’s wife—

That you’ve got the name Annapurna (filling all with food) at Banaras.

O Aparna (Uma), when I married you (to Siva),

Siva went about begging for morsels.

Today what a delightful news I hear, O giver of fortune!

Are you the Goddess of the Universe seated at the left of

the God of the Universe?

Mad and eccentric they called my naked one (Siva),

Abuses galore have I endured thereafter in houses innumerable;

Now sit door-keepers at the naked one’s door, they say;

And Indra, Chandra, and Death get no interview.

Siva had the Himalayas as his abode;

Days there were when begging brought his daily food;

Now he rolls in Kubera’s wealth.

Has fortune smiled on him by your good luck?

There’s indeed more affluence now, methinks,

Else how is Gauri (Uma) so proud?

She opens not her eyes at her own son,

And turns her face at Radhika’s (poet’s) name.

The song was, so to say, an exact replica of the Mother’s life; and so every one heard it with rapt attention. Yogin-Ma and Golap-Ma who were in the inner apartment wanted to hear the song again, and it was sung again. When at last the beggar left with some presents, grandmother commented, ‘Forsooth, my dears, in those days all called my son-in-law mad, cursed my Sarada’s fortune, and flung many a hard word at me; so I felt like dying. And see today, what a number of boys and girls of good families are worshipping Sarada’s feet knowing her to be a goddess!’

In accordance with the custom of the family the worship of Jagad-dhatri continued for three days. The Mother was ever busy cooking and doing other works. But at the evening service every day she stood with folded hands before the Deity or fanned Her with the chamara (yak’s tail). People from all around were fed on these days, and on two nights there were yatras.

Three days after the worship was over, Swami Saradananda and others were laid up with malaria. The Mother became greatly anxious and went on repeating, ‘Mother gracious! What’s in store? The boys are all suffering in their beds.’ During her moments of leisure she stood at the door-way looking silently at her sons. Milk could not easily be had in that village; still she moved from door to door collecting it by ounces till she got enough for their diet. As soon as they recovered, they decided that, since their continued stay was so very taxing to the Mother, they had better start for Calcutta without further delay. But the Mother expostulated, ‘You’ll go only after fuller recovery and after gaining more strength.’ Nevertheless, they started in bullock-carts on the appointed day. As they were leaving, the Mother looked on wistfully from the backdoor with tearful eyes. Golap-Ma and Yogin-Ma, too, could not restrain their tears; and from Kalikrishna’s eyes a few drops rolled down unawares. After they had gone some distance he looked back to find that the Mother had followed them and was standing on the bank of the Badujye-pukur with eyes fixed on them. The wheels of their carts crackled on till the Mother was totally out of sight. Kalikrishna kept on thinking all the way, ‘Whoever could imagine from what one heard that the Mother is really such a mother, that she would take by storm one’s heart and soul in this way and make one dearer than the dearest! I loved my own mother very fondly to be sure; but here is one who was and will be a mother for all lives past and future —one’s own mother for all time.’

From the October of 1891 to the middle of 1893, i.e., for about two and a half years, the Mother stayed in the country-side; and then she came to live at Belur in the garden house of Nilambar Babu, where among others Swami Trigunatitananda attended to her needs. He was very mindful of his duties to the minutest detail. For instance, he used to spread a clean cloth below a shephalika (weeping nyctanthes) tree, so that the flowers dropping from it at night might not get spoiled by touching the ground. He then collected these together for the Mother to be used during her worship.

One of the foremost events of this period was the performance of the panchatapa (five-fire) austerity by the Mother. After the Master left the body, the Holy Mother’s dislike for life became so very strong that though she performed her duties mechanically, she kept on thinking that, as the Master was no longer in flesh and blood, her life was altogether a meaningless thing. She had no taste for anything, nor any liking for gossip. In order to remove that sorrow, the devotees took her to different places of pilgrimage. When she was at Banaras, there used to come to her a nun who hailed from Nepal and who was versed in diverse esoteric practices. Studying the Mother’s mental condition she advised her saying, ‘Mother, you undertake thepanchatapa. ’ That directed the Mother’s thoughts to a new channel. It occurred to her that if the outer fires could be made unendurably hot, the internal fire might be subdued a little. Moreover, the belief began to grow in her that, after all, her life might not be quite useless; for in her ears were still ringing the words of the Master, ‘You must not die; you have to stay on.’ She was still in that vacillating frame of mind when super-normal visions or divine directions egged her on to undertake that austerity. At Kamarpukur she had seen with open eyes a girl of eleven or twelve years of age moving about her—sometimes in front of her and sometimes behind, with hair unkempt, and with an ochre cloth and a necklace of rudraksha beads on her person. It looked as though the Mother’s extreme abhorrence for the world consequent on the Master’s demise had taken the form of that young nun. The Mother had another vision also very frequently; a monk, with clean shaven face and head, suggested to her to undertake the panchatapa. At first she ignored such visions; but the Sannyasi (monk) persisted in his advice, till at last the desire for panchatapa became active in her mind during her stay at Belur. She did not know what it meant actually; and hence she consulted Yogin-Ma, who said encouragingly that she too would undertake it. Arrangements, were accordingly made for both of them. The roof of the one-storeyed portion of their house was covered with earth, and over this at intervals of about seven and a half feet (five cubits) four big fires were set ablaze in a square with cow-dung cakes, and overhead was the fiery summer sun. The Mother bathed in the Ganges and then came to the fires, the sight of which filled her with some dismay. But Yogin-Ma cheered her saying, ‘Get in Mother, why are you afraid?’ So with a silent prayer to the Master she got in, and Yogin-Ma sat by her. Once she was there, it seemed as though the fire had lost its heat. Meditation and japa continued within the circle of fires, till the morning sun slowly reached the zenith, poured down its scorching rays awhile, and then as slowly sank below the western horizon. The Mother and Yogin-Ma then came out. This went on for seven days till the scarred skin of the body looked quite black. The mental fire was then appeased a little; and the ochre-clothed girl departed for ever.

The Mother stood the terrible fiery ordeal. But when speaking of this incident in later days, she did not seem to attach any great importance to it. For instance, when a devotee asked, ‘What’s the need of austerity?’ The Mother answered, ‘Penance is necessary. Even Parvati did it for Siva. These are undertaken for the good of the people.

Otherwise they will say, “Why, she eats, drinks, and lives just like any other person.” As for panchatapa and such other things, these are feminine practices, just like the observance of vows, you know. The Master undertook all kinds of practices. He used to say, “I have made the die; you now shape your metal on them”’ An intimate devotee asked, ‘Where is the need for your doing so much penance?’ The Mother replied, ‘For the sake of you all, my son. How can the boys do so much? Hence I have to.’

The panchatapa might have mitigated to some extent the internal grief; but still the need for continuing in the body was not becoming quite obvious to her. That conviction, too, was not long in coming as the result of a unique vision. It was a full moon night. The bright moonbeams were dancing on the white ripples of the Ganges like molten silver. The Mother came out to the head of the steps leading to the water to enjoy that beauty without any other thought in her mind. Suddenly Sri Ramakrishna emerged from behind and rushed down by her into the river, and his body of pure spirit got dissolved in the holy waters of the river, which has been washing away the sins of millions of people for ages. The sight made the Mother’s hair stand on end. Dumbfounded, she kept her eyes fixed there, when all of a sudden, Swami Vivekananda burst upon the view from nowhere and shouting with elation, ‘Glory unto Ramakrishna’ went on sprinkling handfuls of that water over the millions of people standing around, who, before her very eyes, became freed from this world at the very touch of that water. The vision was so vivid and lifelike, that for days together she could not step into the Ganges for bathing for fear of touching the Master’s divine body with her feet. This transcendent vision had another effect; it impressed on her mind indelibly and for ever the true meaning of the new avatar’s life; and from a consideration of its implication she came to believe that she had an important part to play in fulfilling his mission.

The intense desire for doing good that was thus taking shape in the Mother’s mind through various visions and thoughts, expressed itself in its full beauty in this very house through a touching incident. Nag Mahashaya1 believed the Mother to be none other than the Mother of the Universe. The day that he came to the Mother’s house happened to be the eleventh day of the moon when orthodox Hindus do not eat rice, curries, lentil soups, etc., but take other and lighter things according to convenience. The Mother had sat for her scanty repast when the maid-servant announced, ‘Mother, who is Nag Mahashaya? He is bowing down to you; but he is striking his head so hard (against the pavement) that, methinks, it will bleed. Maharaj (Swami Yogananda) entreats him so earnestly from behind to stop, but there’s no answer, as though he is unconscious. Is he mad, Mother?’ In those days men devotees were not allowed to appear directly before the Mother but they bowed by touching the steps with their heads, and the maidservant went in to announce, ‘Mother, they are saluting you.’ On the present day no sooner the Mother heard about this self-forgetful devotee, than filled with affection she said to the woman, ‘My dear, ask Yogen (Swami Yogananda) to send him here.’ When Yogananda himself led Nag Mahashay by his hand to the Mother’s presence, she noticed that his forehead was swollen, his eyes full of tears, and his steps unsteady. Because of his tears he could not see the Mother; it was as though he was no longer in the conscious world. The Mother was so much moved by this sight that she forgot her natural shyness and taking hold of the hand of her devout son made him sit by her. Nag Mahashaya was still crying, ‘Mother, Mother’—as though in a state of delirium, and yet he was otherwise so peaceful and unobtrusive! The Mother wiped away his tears. There were the articles of food in front—roots, fruits, and sweets. The Mother ate a little and with her own hand put some of these into Nag

Mahashaya’s mouth. His mind, however, was then so completely in-drawn that he could not eat these, but went on repeating as before, ‘Mother, Mother!’ and sat holding her feet with both hands. The other women suggested, ‘Mother, your meal is being spoiled. Let us ask Maharaj (Yogananda) to take him away. ’ But the Mother replied, ‘Let him alone! Let him calm down a little.’ The Mother patted his head and body and uttered in his ears the name of the Master for some time; and then only he came round. The Mother now resumed her meal and went on feeding Nag Mahashaya, too, like a child. When he was being led down after the meal, he kept on telling the Mother, ‘Not I, not I; but you, you.’ The Mother drew the attention of those present there to this and remarked, ‘Look what perfect wisdom!’ Overpowered with the joy of receiving food from the Mother’s own hand, Nag Mahashaya said further, ‘Mother is kinder than Father (Master), Mother is kinder than Father.’ The Mother loved this son of hers very deeply and had the confidence that he could do everything for her.

There is another example of the Mother’s affectionate dealings with Nag Mahashaya, which belongs to another period of time, and most probably to a different place, but is being introduced here for convenience of treatment. Putting on a dirty and worn out piece of cloth and with a basket of mangoes from his own garden on his head, Nag Mahashaya came to the Mother’s house. The mangoes were of a special quality and some of them were marked with lime. At the Mother’s house he went on moving about with the basket on his head. He would not give it to anybody, nor would he speak. At last Swami Yogananda sent word: ‘Tell Mother that Nag Mahashaya has come with mangoes; he says nothing nor does he hand it over to anybody.’ The Mother on hearing this said, ‘Send him here.’ Nag Mahashaya came with the basket on head and when a Brahmachari took it down, he made his obeisance at the Mother’s feet, who noticed that he was as unconscious as on the previous occasion. He was repeating the name of the Master and while calling on the Mother tears were rolling down his chest. As the Master’s worship had not been finished, some of the mangoes were cut and offered to him When, after the worship, Yogin-Ma gave to the Mother on a leaf a few mango pieces, she took some of them and told Golap-Ma, ‘Bring another sal leaf.’ On that leaf she placed some of the pieces and asked Nag Mahashaya to eat them But who was to do so? He had no physical sense; the hands were as good as paralysed. The Mother took hold of his hand and entreated him to eat, but he simply took a piece and began rubbing it on his head. Helplessly the Mother had to ask someone to come up and lead him down.

There he kept on striking his head on the steps till the forehead became swollen, and at long last, when consciousness returned, he left for home without partaking of the consecrated food.

When the Mother was living on the top of a godown near the Ganges in Calcutta, Nag Mahashaya visited her there. She gave him some prasada on a sal leaf. Through an intensity of devotion he looked upon everything touched by the sacred prasada as prasada itself and gulped down the leaf also. On another occasion the Mother gave him a piece of cloth, which he considered too sacred to be dishonored by wearing; and so he tied it on his head as a turban. The Mother’s affection for Nag Mahashaya found expression in a hundred ways even after his demise. A devotee one day noticed on entering the Mother’s bedroom that she had hung up on the walls the pictures of Swami Vivekananda, Girishchandra Ghosh, and Nag Mahashaya, each of which she approached one after the other, wiped with a piece of cloth, put a mark of sandal paste, and then patted it with her hand. Last of all she said, keeping her eyes on Nag Mahashaya’s picture, ‘Quite a number of devotees come; but not another like this one.’

After passing some months at the garden house of Nilambar Babu, the Mother, most probably, went to Jayrambati. Then, when in the month of

Paush (December-January) 1893-94, Balaram Babu’s daughter Bhuvanmohini died, her mother Krishnabhavini Devi became so stricken with grief and so emaciated through disease that she had to be sent out for a change to Kailwar, about eighteen miles east of Arrah, in Bihar. But Krishnabhavani Devi agreed to go on condition that the Holy Mother would be with her. Accordingly, the Mother came to Calcutta in the beginning of 1894 and left for Kailwar with Krishnabhavani and her mother, as also Golap-Ma, Swamis Saradananda, Yogananda, and Trigunatitananda, and Swami Yogananda’s father Sri Navinchandra Chaudhury. They stayed there for two months. At Kailwar the

Mother was delighted to see the wild deer moving in formation like a triangle and shooting away like arrows at the slightest sense of fear. She also noticed a strange device of the local people. Lest the jackals should drink of the date juice from the pots hung from the small palms, they hid themselves in pits in the ground, covering their heads with earthen vessels, and when the jackals approached, they drove them away by raising a cry.

After Kailwar the Mother was again at Jayrambati, where she, as also her mother, fell ill, and Akshayakumar Sen, a devotee of the Master, called in a physician for their treatment. Then she came to stay at Belur till she was invited by Matangini Devi, mother of Swami Premananda and Krishnabhavini Devi, to be present at their home at Antpur where they were restarting the worship of Durga after a lapse of several years. They were all overjoyed to have her in their midst, and along with her Sri Shantiram Ghosh (brother of Swami Premananda), Yogin-Ma, Golap-Ma, and Saradananda. After the celebrations, the Mother left for Jayrambati (October, 1894).

She returned to Calcutta in the beginning (probably February) of 1895. The desire again rose in her mind to go on a pilgrimage to North India. Accordingly, she had her mother and some of her brothers brought to Calcutta, and with them all, as well as Swami Yogananda, Golap-Ma, and Yogin-Ma, she left for Banaras and Vrindaban. At the latter place, they stayed for about two months (middle of February to middle of April); and then they came back to Calcutta, from where her relatives left for Jayrambati. But she spent a month at the Colootola house of Master Mahashaya, after which she went to Jayrambati by way of Kamarpukur

(13th May, 1895).1

From Vrindabani, the Mother had brought a small image of Gopala (Baby Krishna), which lay at her Jayrambati house without any worship. One day, as the Mother lay on her cot, she saw Gopala crawling to the cot and saying, ‘You brought me here, but have shelved me away—you don’t give me any food, you don’t worship. If you don’t worship me, none will.’ The Mother got up at once, brought out Gopala from where he was and kissed him by touching his chin with her hand, and after offering him some flowers placed him near the Master’s picture. From that day Gopala never again missed his daily worship along with the Master’s. We have noted that during her stay in the village, the Mother spent some time at Kamarpukur also. Thus in November, 1895, she was there with Golap-Ma who suffered then from malaria.

We next meet the Holy Mother in Calcutta during the marriage of Sri Ramakrishna Bose, son of Balaram Babu, which took place in the second week of May (27th Vaishakh), 1896. As Balaram Babu’s house was rather crowded with guests, she was accommodated in the house of Sri Sharat Sarkar, a young devotee of the Master. When the Mother was there, one day, a letter from Swami Vivekananda, urging all to take up the service of Narayana in all beings, was read to her; and she remarked, ‘Naren (Vivekananda) is an instrument of Thakur (the Master) who makes him write these words for inspiring his children and devotees for doing his work, for doing good to all in the world. What Naren writes is true and must be fulfilled hereafter.’ Referring to this stay of the Mother in the house of Sharat Sarkar, his friends and others would say, ‘ Sharat, you have performed Durga worship for about a month, while people do it for three days only. Whereas they worship a clay image, you have worshipped a living image of the Divine Mother’.

After a month had been spent here she was accommodated in a rented house near the Ganges on the Sarkar Bari Lane, in Baghbazar (Calcutta). On the ground floor of the house was stocked turmeric, whence it was called the godown (Gudam-badi); the first and second floors were habitable. The topmost floor was allotted to the Mother and other women devotees. The Mother had a wide view of the Ganges from there. On the lower floor lived Swamis Brahmananda, and Yogananda, and a few other monks who attended to the Mother’s needs. The Mother lived here for some five or six months, and then left for the village after the worship of Kali in November. During her next visit, which came off in the second quarter of 1898, she lived at 10/2 Bosepara Lane, Baghbazar.

1. There are divergent theories about the identity of the image. It seems that the temple changed hands and the deity too was differently conceived.

1. A brahmin who guides the pilgrims and officiates as their priest at a holy place.

1. The sequence of events from Puri onward, follows the unpublished memoirs of Master Mahashaya, with which the footnote on, p. 154 of Shri Shri Mayer Katha, part I, as also the account in it on pp. 31718, are strikingly in accord.

1. Some more accounts will be given in our chapter on Girishchandra Ghosh. A letter dated the 3rd Falguna, 1297 Bengali era, (or February, 1891), written to Master Mahashaya from Kamarpukur, reveals that the Mother had been there even earlier and had been hearing the Gita from her brother Abhay, while her niece Lakshmi Devi had gone to Dakshineswar for a dip in the Ganges.

1. The Bengali mothers touch the chins of their grown up children with the tips of their right hand fingers, and then kiss those fingers. The Holy Mother followed this custom in the case of very young disciples. The word kiss in this volume means this only.

2. A dead body is cremated by setting fire to it. Because of this evil association mothers do not directly hand over fre to their children.

1. Durgacharan Nag, a devotee of the Master.

1. On page 319 of Shri Shri Mayer Katha, part I, we read, ‘Returning from there (Vrindavan), the Mother lived at the Colootola house of Master Mahashaya for about a month. ’ In his unpublished memoirs, too, Master Mahashaya mentions that the Mother left for Jayrambati from his house at 52 Bhavani Datta Lane (Colootola).