36 IN THE VISION OF GOD
from Ernaknlam. A party of abont a dozen people consist-
ing of the friends and their families started. They reached
the small village in due time. They directed their steps to
a garden on the bank of the Alwaye river where stood two
temples—one of Sharada and the other of Hahadev. In
front of the temples there was a raised plastered pedestal ~
rectangular in shape—signifying the spot where the remains
of Shankaracharya's mother had been interned.
The surrounding scenery was most fascinating. It pos-
sessed all the beauty, simplicity and calmness of the country-
side. Around the shrine, groves of jack-fruit and mango
displaying exuberant verdure, and the tall cocoanut trees
shooting up from their midst to a great height and nodding
their crested tops in the breeze, yielded shade and coolness,
and cast a bewitching spell on that sacred spot.
An aged brahman—an old resident of the place—
recounted to the party the ancient episodes and legends
relating to the place, and also told them of the visits of
eminent personages to the shrine. He said that he had the
unique privilege of serving Swarni Vivekananda when he
came to Kalady, during his itinerant life.
The well-known incident in Shankaracharya's life which
determined his adoption of sannyas, when he was still a
boy, took place on the bank of the river Alwaye. The boy
Shankara was insisting upon his mother to permit him to
live a life of utter dedication to God, instead of the ordi-
nary life of a householder, immersed in the worldly cares
and desires. The mother -would not agree.
One day, when the mother had taken the boy as usual
for a bath in the Alwaye river and he was knee-deep in
water, a crocodile suddenly caught his leg and began to
drag Mm away into the deep waters.
"H)other, mother," he called oat, "a crocodile has
caught hold of my leg" and is dragging me down into the
depths of the stream. I will presently sink and be devoured
by it. There is only one way to save me and that is, if you