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HEART BUDS.
C. R. Doraswami Maidu B.
PRICE RUPEE
PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR
C f R Doraswami Naidu B. A. of Bangalore,
during his sojourn at Ahmedabad.
Printed at
The Diamond Jubitee Printing Press-Salapose Road,
BY
Devidas Chhaganlal Parikh,
AHMEDABAD.
ist Edition. 1000 copies.
1914-
All Rights Reserved.
Contents.
PAGE,
1. Foreword.
2. To the Motherland ... I
3. Nature.... 5
4. The Taj Mahal 9 ... " ' 7
5. The Palitana Flood ; 7
6. To a White Rose 8
7. To Miss K. Ghose. Sonnets 10
8. Youthful Fancies **
9. Chandrabala I2
10. Tribute to Jamnagar 14
11. Retrospect and Prospect, Bhawnagar ... 17
12. An Extempore Ode Do 19
13. The Beggar Woman 3I
14. Memorial Sonnet 25
j{ . Sonnet 2 S
16. Fragmentary poems.
The Gohil Princess of Saurashtra: 26
1. The Gohil Rajputs 27
2. H. H. Sir Bhavsinhji II 29
3. The Princess 3
4. A Prophetic Dream. ... ... 52
5. Songs 33
6. The Sunderbagh Palace 34
;. The Victoria Park 34
8. A Soliloquy ; 35
9. The Betrothal * ' 3$
10. The Festive Capital 3 8
u. The Bridal Morning 39
12. The Procession to Nilambagh 39
13. The Wedding 4 1
14. The Celebrations at the Albert Victor Square,.. 42
j5. The Indian May Pole 4*
l& The Jx>ta Dance * 43
I7 The Departure ... 44
18 Paternal Blessings 48
17- An acrostic Birth-day ode to. H. H. the Maharaja
Raja Sawai Holkar of Indore . 49
1 8. Memorial ode to the Jain temples in Gujerat ... 50
19. To. K. V. M. A vision Young India 52
20. Sonnet ... ... ... 55
21. To. Y. M.S. Alone on the Himalayan Heights... 56
22. Birth-day ode to H. E, Lord Hardinge 58
Addresses to Young India.
23 I An address on, " The Higher Life." 62
24. II An, oration on "The Culture of Manhood and
Character 73
25. Ill An address on " The Function of Poetry. "... 91
ERRATJff.
Page.
Line.
7
U
19
H
49
i
61
10
72
28
74
3i
78
3
80
12
80
23
80
30
For.
Sleepy
entempore
mountains
what they thy
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Sleep by
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To,
Sbetb Cbimanlal flfoanefclal
flDunsbaw,
Shree Eamkrishna Mills,
Foreword*
In launching forth this barge of mine,
Upon the vast Atlantic brine,
Alone and friendless with my muse,
In search of Hope and faith, I cruise.
I trust its fate to mercy's wave,
For it was built my faith to save,
I stranded was beside this isle,
In haste I made it in this style;
A simple shallop in its face,
It took for building twenty days !
Ye gales that mighty Titans shake
Upon my shallop pity take;
Yon stormy ocean shoreward breaks,
In billows foaming with their flakes;
My canoe trembles tossed amain,
It struggles with the waves in vain.
I have a fancy for the sea,
I wish to build a ship for me.
And if the promise of my art,
Doth promise give of better sort,
If time and tide, do favours bring,
My India's fame I live to sing,
If breathing time, these tempests give,
The seeds of truth, to sow, I live,
If Mammon saves my faith and trust.
A Mighty Vessel build I must.
Then shall I brave the stormy seas,
My banners waving in the breeze,
From India shall I take some rare
And mystic thoughts to Europe's fair!
To Europe lost in seeking self
In fleeting shades of power and pelf;
To Greece the ancient, classic home
Where freedom lost in dreams did roam,
Where Athens, Thebes their shadows cast
As fables of a dreamy past;
Whose dreamy dotage gave its way
To Roman Eagle's sweeping sway-
Italia! Thou land of great
And mighty Caesars' mighty fate,
Thy legions sleep in snowy graves,
Thy conquests left thy sons as slaves,
Till from thy plough a hero rose,
A Masterr-mind defied thy foes!
Britania, my Island blest,
Thy Britons broaden East and Wesrt
Thy Union Jack is waving free,
On Continent and Colony !
I have a fancy for the sea,
I wish to build a ship for me.
O how Iwish to sail thy seas,
My banners waving in the breeze.
Great Chaucer guide me from the gales,
The Fairy Prince unfurl my sails,
The Soul of Avon pilot me,
The Epic-Soldier rudder be.
8
My keel be planned on Wordsworth's lines,
My rafts as Tennyson designs,
If Byron comes again to be,
Bereft of passion, tempered free,
And Keats sings through his "Greecian Urn,"
And Shelley doth from 's ramblings turn,
How shall I brave the stormy seas,
My banners waving in the breeze!
O England I How I hope to be,
The Hope of Indian Minstrelsy,
A worthy cargo shall I bring,
When I shall India's glory sing !
HEART BUDS.
TO THE MOTHERLAND.
My native land, my native shores,
Where dewy morning dawns,
Where many a torrent proudly roars,
To court the smiling lawns.
Thy sacred feet are washed by waves,
Whom Kanya's rock divides-
Kumary kneeling proudly braves,
The meeting of the tides*
Thy summer belts are set with palms
For milky nuts renowned;
Thy limpid currents sing the psalms
Of life in sweetness drowned.
Beneath thy shades of plantain groves
Whose banners swell the brsez^,
Thy rural beauty madly roves
. To kiss the bridal trees.
Thy artcient homes of pilgrimage,
Thy citadels of fame,
Thy great Himalyas, grey with age,
Thy mightiness proclaim!
Thy womanhood^ a noble band
Of world's immortal gems,
Thy dames to virtue wedded stand,
Heroic diadems.
Thy meadow blossoms bloom to greet
The maids of Travapcore,
Thy mountains) fragrance, rich and sweet,
On Kashmir beauties pour;
Their slender forms like creepers seem
To grow in beauty's groves,
And on their cheeks the apples dream
And violets on their brows.
Thy Heart, a garden full of flowers,
Thou Hope of dreamy youth,
Thy music melting into showers
Of Universal Truth;
Where laughing waters leaping go
Revolving cataracts,
Where northern winds commanding blow,
Defying human acts.
Where Phoebus kneels at Nandy's feet
Or\ I\ailas' crystal floor,
Eternal snows evolve the heat
Of hoary Vedic lore.
My garden-forests, ocean streams
My snow-clad mountain slopes,
My world's record of mystic dreajns,
My fairy land of hopes !
My happy Kashmir's lovely vales,
My Paradise on earth,
Where apple gardens blush in dales,
Of beauty taken birth.
My wild Mahratta Ghats of yore,
My Malwa's mellow plains,
My marble rocks of Jubbulpore,
And Vindhyas rugged chains.
My Amarnath in caves of snow
With ffags of silver pines,
My Ganges glassing in thy flow
My KashPs golden shrines.
My Mysore Home, my land of gold,
My groves of Chandan trees,
Of emerald hills and vales untold,
Where Champaks scent the breeze.
My golden Bengal, glorious land
Of genius full in bloom,
Whose spirit wakes in sweet command
Religion from its tomb!
Thy singers soaring high above,
Entrance thy hopeful r#ce;
Thy damsels send their darts of love
Their heroes' deeds embrace.
Thy music flows in full-brimmed flood,
Delighting thirsty souls,
Thy canvas glows with living blood
Which chivalry extols.
Thy voice of thunder, lightning charged,
With love of truth resounds,
Thy MK>ice of freedom, faith enlarged,
In one pulsation bounds*
Historic Gujerat, slowly freed
From custom*s iron cage,
Renowned for Krishna's ancient creed,
And holy hermitage.
Thy pulse of rising trade is felt
Thro' rolling clouds that make
Thy great metropolis, the belt
Of industry awake !
Heroic Punjab, land of deeds,
Recorded with the blood,
Of martyrdom whose mem'ry feeds
The nation-feeding flood.
Thou altar oft where India's crown
The victor-hordes received,
My Thermopolae of renown,
My gate of hopes deceived.
My India whom I love to see
Advancing with the times,
In league with all humanity
In tune with vedic chimes,
Thou art a gem in Britain's Crown,
Resplendant with thy love,
Thy Kohinoor of great renown,
Shines on our Sovereign's brow !
O Britain ! Land of liberty,
Heroic mother that breeds
The heroes of humanity
And nation-making creeds,
Thy Parliament of Justice is
Our Parliament of Hopes,
Our genius fed in freedom's breeze
In search of freedom gropes !
My India, how I love to see,
Advancing with the times,
In love with all humanity,
In tune with freedom's chimes !
Nature*
It breathes in woodlands, grassy dales,
It shines thro' sunny shores,
And sings along the bowery vales,
In thunderstorm it roars*
It melts the sun-beams into glare
And prances with the rills,
It dances with the n^oonlight fair,
And echoes thro' the hills. *
It wakes the earth to grass and leaf,
And builds the root and tree, <
It cradles on the golden sheaf
And feeds humanity.
It burnishes the shield of life
With loving peace to all,
It rules the cosmos without strife
And heralds duty's call.
It trusts the man-child with the key
Of freedom of the soul,
t Of 'passing immortality-
The Universal Goal!
But rebel-man mislaid his key,
Unbridled senses roam,
In virtue of his liberty,
Away from far his home.
To build his hut, he tears the bowers
That greet him fancy free,
He takes delight to rend the flowers
That bloom in purity.
His gentle hands are red with gore
Of dumb-creation's lives,
To free them from his vice implore
Bewailing hearts in gyves.
He bakes his nuts and roots and peel,
He sets his heart on fire,
With wanton wisdom cooks his meal,
His culture builds his pyre.
What beauty breaks thro' blooms by day,
And stars by curtained night,
With thousand summers ceaseless sway
"The oak retains his might.
And not by force we earn our days
And not thro' blood our health,
In nature's law of love and grace,
In nature is our wealth.
And nature speaks where silence reigns,
In darkness shines her light,
On virtue's altar pours her strains
For struggling soul's delight.
The Taj Mahal-Agra.
The Taj, the Taj, my soul's delight,
A world's refuge, a wondrous dome,
A fairy dome of frozen light,
And love's enamoured crystal home!
Behold in weary summer nights
When Jumna's stream with saphires shine,
And sweet the radiant moon invites
The devotees of truth divine,
The shadow of her beauty sleeps,
And in that beauty sleeps the love
That drowned in sorrow ever weeps,
Bedewing Jumna's anguished brow,
Whose rippling breast in sorrow turns;
Where sunbeams lingering sleepy day,
The silver moon within her burns
That love in death forgets her sway.
Pause, stranger, pause, and see the fate
Of human love for fleeting breath,
The circle mpves from state to state,
Of endless waves of life and death*. *
Love blesseth him on whom it breathes,
To Shah Jahan it gave her sway,
And crowning him with amaranth wreathes,
It frozen dreams where Mumtaz by!
The Palitana Flood,
The clouds above hung gathered
* As if the heavens were tethered
To darkness, In dreadful array;
8
The winds below bufst howling
And thunderstorms blew growling,
Foreboding the fate of the day i
And flashing fire in madness,
Went thunderbolts in sadness,
Increasing again and again
The Shatrunjais were shaken,
When Satan's hosts did waken
The terror of tempest and raitt !
It wetit dh iftftdly potitfftg
Aldfcg the ridges foariftg
As heavens dissolving in rains;
All BhitevapUra was sleeping
When death descended sweeping,
The town and its sacifed remains.
The cattle fail bellowing
When torrents rolled on flowing,
Submergirig the hamtet in sleep,
And rushiftg thto' their holdings,
crushing thro' their foldings,
The living and dfead iil a
To a White Rose.
Fragrant star on earth,
Love itself thy birth,
Dreaming ever in mirth J
Robfed in webs of purity,
Fresh thy dew- washed face,
Sweet thy petaled gt-^c^,
Bright thy beautedlis rays,
When the sun is on th^e lea !
Blessed blossom thou,
Breathing purest love,
Wearing on thy brow
Innocence and Jollity !
Bursting into song
Morning streams along
Shaking light among
Silver petals fragrance free!
Wakes the earth from sleep,
Light the breezes leap
Singing as they keep
Dancing on thy throbbing breast !
Slow the voices come
Like the distant drum,
Offering sweet welcome
Honey bees hum on thy crest.
Filled with loveliness
Driving all distress
Lips of love express
Peace divine which worship yields;
Moonshine smitten lies,
In thy love-sick eyes,
Soul of sacrifice,
What a joy thy spirit wields!
Painter's colour prime,
Sculptor's pose sublime,
Poet's speechless rhyme,
In thy being brimming flow;
Beauty crowns the leas,
Sweetness draws the bees,
Music melts in peace
On thy open breasts of snowf
10
TO MISS K. GOSH,
(In praise of the Girls Schools in
Sonnet*
What praises can I proffer on your worth,
Ye stars of future hopes, in whom, untold,
Resides the pristine glories of a nation old
In godliness and feminine grace on earth.
Your schools are shrines of learning where the birth
Of Spartan womanhood, with faith combined,
Creates a race of transcendental mind
Of stoic virtues, love and rural mirth !
Thou priestess of these shrines, the songs
Of blessings sung by little kids, the dance
With lotas, cithar tunes dissolving soul
To speechless bliss, the maypole dance which longs
To shape the ideal of their romance,
Triumphant pave their march to freedom's goal !
Sonnet,
Fair daughters of my land, behold the way
Of parsing from our aimless wintry life
Which peeps thro' painted scenes of social strife,
To summer glories, lies in ye to-day!
The throbbing future throws its gleams which play
Upon your virgin brows, like sunbeams
On glit'ring downs of snow or silver streams.
My Home, my India, thro' faith's decay
Thy ancient virtues trampled lie; thy joys
Of universal peace hath left thy sons,
ti
Whose prostrate minds the love of pomp embrace !
O England! Mighty land of freedom's voice,
I would the stream of Britain's India runs
To swell the her'tage of the human race !
Youthful Fancies.
Whene'er I see the wheeling flights
Of sprightly birds on high,
I wonder how they sail the heights,
With tiny wings to fly.
Whene'er I hear the warbling notes
Of birds on summer trees,
The music of! my being floats
My heart in melodies.
When I behold the roses bloom
Mid streams of dancing light,
A mystic beauty drives my gloom
And leaves me in delight.
Whene'er I meet a maiden's eyes
With wonder on her brows,*
A world of dreamy thoughts arise,
Like leaves in summer groves.
Whene'er I scale the heights of fame
On steps of pomp and pride,
I see the shadow of my name,
: With 'vanity my guide.
Whene'er I view the azure skies,
Their sister lakes below,
In search of self my spirit flies,
On Brings of thought I go !
but when, O God, I think of Thee,
Thy glory's shoreless seas,
In speechless sleep of ecstasy,
My being melts *in peace!
Chandrabala.
In famous Rajkote far away,
In Kathiawar of ancient fame,
There lived an aged couple and gay,
Tho' carping was their constant game.
An Indian saying says aright,
As age advances, love too grows,
And day revolving into night,
Affection's taper brightly glows.
It was not so with this old pair
For sooner when with dusk of night,
The husband homeward 'turned with care,
And met the house- wife's searching sight,
Than streamed from her in accents wild
A flow of crisp and rude abuse,
The frightened husband, love-beguiled,
Stood shivering chill within his shoes.
And not with fiery words to vie,
His palpitating heart did quail,
But shuddered to be tortured by
The tigress with her tooth and nail.
And to this home of noisy fame
A child of five was wont to go,
And Chandrabala was her name,
With lips of roses, limbs of snow.
Mannu was her sister dear,
Who fed her mind with tales of love,
To worship God and sin to fear,
With innocence upon her brow.
And one day when the evening light
Revelled in robes of shimmering gold,
The cattle homeward came, in sight
Of darkness gathering, fold < by fold;
When warbling birds their cradles sought,
The farmer tired unyoked his team,
And pretty maidens laughing brought
Their pots of water from the stream,
The gentle Chandra dreaming sat,
And Mannu watched her from the room,
Why ndneet played the cruel cat
When twilight brought the husband home,
The gentle Chandra wept to see,
The wicked ndnee tease the man,
She offered prayers watchfully
o
When wordy warfare she began.
She took her ndnee's hand one day,
And preached the duties of a wife
'Thy husband is thy lord, for aye,
And loving rule him, not by strife!"
And when her husband homeward came,
In reverence meek she welcomed him,
The husband's gladness, shook his frame,
With tears of joy, his eyes grew dim.
__ ; - .. .-.--...... i .. _... ' .:-_!. ' . --- .-].._-.- *ti
f An old woman .
And ''what's" he asked, "the wonder, wife,
A change has newly dawned on thee."
"Thy husband is thy lord of life,
Was Chandra's advice unto me."
Remember ye who rule by strife,
The gentle Chandra's gentle words,
That love illumines earthly life
And love abiding peace affords !
A tribute to the city of Jamnagar,
Land of ancient greatness, Yadav Kings' historic
clime,
Land where Lord Sree Krishna trod before he sang
his song sublime--
Holding lofty thoughts of God-hood, showering Justice
from above,
Clothed in language, mystic wisdom, rich in lore of
peace and love !
Where departed ancient virtue and thy virile, hardy
race,
Where the trophies of the fame did India's wealth
and art embrace,
Where those noble deeds of valour, bearing marks
of noble birth,
Where thy saintly men and women, living acts of
moral worth?
Jamnagar now stands to-day heroic proof of .deeds
of fame,
Golrious jewel gracely set in KathiawarV goldeft
frame.
Lofty towers, ancient mansions, spread about in
chaos bold,
Speak aloud historic greatness of this land of Jams
of old.
Lo the breezy dome of Kota, proudest mass of
ancient art,
Planned it boldly, Ranmul's genius, hero of heroic
heart.
Ev'ry hand that shaped its making, 'scaped from
famine's jaws of death,
Planing, working, dreaming, drudging, breathing last
their honest breath,
Mem'ry wakes from ancient chambers, hoary tales of
doughty deeds,
Wrought within this floating dome where nature
sweet reflection breeds.
Like a proudly sailing swan, careering ' though the
limpid wave,
Ashapura holds the gaze of valiant hearts on turrets
brave
Signal towers lifting high another fort Lakhota
named,
Rising midst the rippling waves, for airy walls and
structure famed.
Here is left the weaving art of golden India's palmy
days,
16
Honsst workers toiling through their looms of
and silver lace.
Here is seen the love of man to let the dumb
creation free,
Mercy, kindness casting forth the future of huma?
nity.
*
Witness ^here in humble dwellings, rural virtues
holding sway,
Simple habits, honest ploughshare working through
the weary day.
Labouring classes live in darkness, live in sweetest
innocence,
Demon-T>rirtk and Slanghter Houses hardly steal
the human sense.
Motely 'masses darkening gathered for awhile 'on
Kotha's dome,
Ev'ry heart was drunk with sorrow atid the land
was filled with gloom,
Till a flash of lightning streamed across Sad6dar's
beauty wild,
Till the showers gently rained upon her own heroic
child-
Victor 'Ranjib-^Britain's *' Ranji " mystic Batsman
o,n , the
Master Sportsman, Champion, Genius, Crowning
;Qem on Cdcket-Shiqld.
17
A Retrospect and Prospect*
Here again historic records take us back to ancient
days,
Kathiawar still bears the hall-mark of the martial
Rajput race.
Rajput blood was put to test,, in deeds to save the
weak from strong
Put to test when village people or their cattle suffered
wrong.
When romantic scenes invited, life was staked to
honour love,
Steel to steel and sword to sword, heroic laurels
crowned their brow.
India's noblest daughters acted true to their paternal
blood,
Smiling 'braced the fun'ral flames when meanness sought
their womanhood.
Days of holding open combat with the lion in its Geer,
Single handed, steed and hunter, chasing panther,
bogtr or deer,
Lie forgotten closely ^buried in the dead 'historic heap,
Sung as tales for soothing old age, lulling youthful
minds to sleep
Bhavanagar's weary days w6re spent in settling bor-
der claims,
Famines taking striding steps to waste the country
in their flames,
Till upon the spent-off wastelands, hamlets, gardens
smiling rose,
For its loving rulers' support statesmanlike it follow-
ed close;
iS
Till the land was spanned with bridges and the Kathis 1
purse was filled
And the feeding tanks, were belted; for the fields that
labour tilled,
Till the seeds of education broadly sown by royal
grace,
Lifted up the drooping spirits of a thrifty, hardy race*
Commerce sprang up slowly riding on the breakers
of the seas
Till the seaport-signal-banners set the railway belts
to breeze.
Wdjesinhji ruled with valour, K humans, Khasias
brought to peace.
Ch4mpraj Wala, Sadul Khasia, bandits made to bend
their knees.
Later on Jaswantsinhji laurels won for ordered reign,
Viceroy Canning Sannad gave to vouchsafe his royal
line.
.E'er as Britain's trusted Chieftains under her impe-
rial sway,
In Kathiawar's Royal Pageant, Bhavanagar leads the
way.
Gallant are the Gohil Chieftains, loyal to the Union
Jack,
Martial spirit, modern culture, leading on the royal
track.
Ancient tales say warrior chieftains led the lions in
their days,
Rcide their chargers with their lances pitching panthers
in the face
Paling all the past records in martial fame or hunterfs
pride
Bhavanagar's gallant Ruler takes the cheeta by his
side,
Household-dogs are hunting cheetas, licking hands
like gentle lambs,
Indian cheeta, Afric's leopard, trained to hunt the
fleetest dams.
Held by waist-belts or their collars, dog-*like walk
the cheetas bold,
When the sun declining goes to gild the West with
burnished gold,
When our gallant Bhavsinhji drives his royal chaise
and pair.
Like a humbled foeman crouches by his side a cheeta
fair.
Like a lion chasing deer, Bhavsinhji, Lion of Thought,
Sage-like drives his people's gloom, feeds the poor
with alms unsought.
"Charity is little preached, but shelters all with un-
known joy,
Charity's departing spirit seeks him like a maiden
Charity, the ancient watchword, India gave Humanity,
Charity, be called by poets, Bhavanagar's Charity \ n
( An entempore poetic elusion OH the birth-day of Yuva-Raj-Kumar
Sree Krishnasinhji Saheb of Bhavamgar> Celebrated by the Bhavsinhji
Club under the august Presidency of ff. ff. (he Maharaja Saheb
Bahadur. )
Delightful Summer sailing on the breeze,
With minstrel Cuckoos, peacocks clarion-voiced,
A joyous welcome offers unto all,
To homage bring to th' Pearl of Palaces,
Or Saphire Gardens smiling on the sward I
20
JJehold the serried clouds from Chamardi's peaks,
Extending flash the gladsome news afar
Where Nandivelo bristling holds the breeze!
Yon silver arrow shot from Dhundi hills
In mystic ripples forming Shatrunjai
Flows gurgling through the plains to vie
Triumphant with the sluggish Sukhbadar !
From Gouri Shankar Lake, whose hilly banks,
Enclose serene retreats to thinking minds,
Sweet voices come of ideas divine !
And lost in meditation deep, sends forth
Thaktesh war's airy dome, its blessing showers.
Elated with the splendour and the song
That Nature weaves to themes of life,
In this assembly, moments lend their love
To stranger tourist yet stranger not forsooth.
And pause why all this summer's pride and song.
For know ye not in nature's sweet domain
The royal trunk of the glorious Gohil Clan
Hath borne a royal fruit to our delight?
Thus ^Np-ture sfhgs her Prince's natal song
Happy let Your Highness be.
Health and honour comfort thee.
Royal Parents crowning Love,
Royalty reveal thy brow !
Innocence be in thy face,
Joyful ever be thy days!
Courage from the Lion's mane,
Wisdom from Thaktdshwar's fane,
Greatness from Himalaya,
Righteousness from Dwaraka,
Added be to royal grace,
Gallant Son of Gohil Race.
The Beggar Woman,
It was a bright
And chilly night,
The streets in silence lay,
The Queen of night
Was shining bright
And pale the Milky Way.
And soft and low,
A voice did go,
A song with pathos filled,
Now rising slow,
With music's flow
The silent air was thrilled.
Afar and near
In accents clear
A woman's song of woe,
Tho' sad to hear
Yet sweet and dear,
Did ringing heavenward go.
And who was she
Who seemed to be
The victim of her songs,
Reminding me,
Unhappy, me,
The woes of human wrongs.
A poor out-caste,
'She stood at last
Before my threshold she,
In mis'ry cast
Her life she passed,
A-begging piteously.
Her robes were torn,
She was forlorn,
A babe was at her breast,
Tho' happy born,
By love forsworn,
No home she had to rest.
The child she haci
Did .make her sad
To drag her weary days,
Yet she was gjad
To see her lad,
Smile in her heart's erabra
Deserted by
A husband's tie,
She wandered mad, a ghost,
As she passed by,
When night was nigh
From pillar to the post.
Her life was now
Bereft of love
She went a crazy mope.
Yet she could love
And knew not how,
The urchin was her hope.
She always found
In sweetness drowned.
In singing love divine,-
Of Radha crowned
With love renowned
In Brindavan did pine.
" O : Lord Divine,
O f Love of mine,
Why. dost ,thou loiter long,
My heart is Thine,,
For Thee I pine^
My Krishna, hear my sdng,
<r O who is she
Who keepeth Thee
Away from my embrace,
To none but Thee,
My love is free
Abiding in Thy Grace.
"O Vrija's bright
Brindavan's Light
My Bansivala, Thou,
My soul's affright
And all is night,
When thou art off my Love.
" Beneath the cool
And beautiful
Thamcila's shady groves,
When Jamuna's full
By many a pool,
We made our merry loves.
" Thine eyelids dark
By Jamuna's park
Of dark Thamdla trees,
Have left their mark
Of kindling spark, -
Which soul-inflaming is.
for that peace
Of shoreless seas,
In search of Thee, I roam,
My spirit sees
My soul's release,
In Thee I have my Home.
+
" The world Thy flute,
Thy lips to suit,
The music of the spheres,
Thou art the root
Of man and brute r
Who soul to soul endears,
Why art Thou mute
And so acute
To pierce my soul to weep,
1 am Thy flute,
Thy lips to suit,
O Kiss my soul to sleep*
"O Vrija's bright
Bripdavan's Light
My Bansivala Thou,
The Queen of night
Is shining bright
O come, my Lord, my Love*
" O Love of mine,
O Lord Divine,
O heed, my Soul my song,
My soul is Thine,
For Thee I pine,
My Krishna, come % along I"
23
Memorial Sonnet
TO
MAJIRAJ BA CHATTRI, BHAVANAGAR.
Behold, yon marble tomb where grief and love
Entangled in eternal friendship brave
Its fond impassioned form, against the wave
Of Ganga-Jalia's reflecting brow,
Where healing zephyrs restless play above
Memorial parks of beauty rising round
This sweet memorial, to the queen renowned^
Whose breezy splendour 'minds a mother's lovef
Ha ! listen to the promptings of the mind
Within the mind, how wondrous are our hopes
And love and faith in God and His decrees!
This fleeting life to thoughts divine inclined,
.Bereft of doubt, and pride and hatred, opes
Reflection's path to love, light and peace.
Sonnet*
In Kathiawar's extensive plains, behold
The golden-mantled antelopes and deer
Protected from insatiate harfds appear^
To browse in peace and looking sweetly bold
While peacocks with their love- sick beauties hold
Enticing sports beneath the shady trees,
Or chasing by retreating banks in ease,
Send forth their jubilant notes from wold to wolcl*
How few the spots in modern India where
The harmless den'zens of the earth and sky,
Are left to ply thefr unmolested lives!
Thou cruel man, tho' nature's laws declare
Thy race is meant for purpose deqp and high,
Why art tfaou bound by sense-enticing gyves?
26
The Panna Diamond
OR
The Qohil Princess of Saurashtra*
( A Fragmentary poem written at the instance of the Bhavnagar
Durbar to be incorporated as poetical embellishments, in the Durbar's
Marriage Souvenir. )
Historic land, where Yddav kings of old,
Ennobled by the feet of Lord Sree Krishna,
Ruled Dwdrakd exalted spot of yore,
Whereto a million pilgrims go from all
The parts of Ind, to render worship unto Him
Whose sacred lips gave out the Song of Life ;
Who by the forelock held the fate of Ind,
And led its destiny to stand the test
Of time, in her domestic, rural life,
And basic laws which human life upholds
In passing on the path of Truth divine,
Till struggling spirit is merged in Bliss Supreme.
So event fade the rule of gods on earth
In virtue of their own Eternal Laws !
And ages after, Dhnivas^nas came ,
And Guptas and the valliant Vdllabhds,
Whose famous citadels, triumphal gates,
And forts and bastions and armouries
AH, time's relentless hand laid dust to dust.
Gone, alas, their deeds achieved on points of steel,
Gone for ever and nothing now remains
Escspt historic mumblings conjuring up
The ghost-like dreams qf dim forgotten ages,
And times eternal waves again rolled on.
Till as a sequel to the fierce and endless strife
That raged in Malwa, Sind and Panchal far,
Which goaded many a hungry tribe and chief,
To wander forth in search of ' pastures new ',
Forgotten Saurashtra rose and fell again
Beneath the feet of tribal jealousies,
To dust for ever trampled by her foes.
The Sun of heated warfare spent his rage
As if to mock the havoc of a flood,
On hamlets looted, pillaged to th' house-tops,
And hay-stacks blown to flaming winds,
For very shame of lending light to deeds
Of cruel consequence, on pitch-dark nights;
The women's agonies, and children's shrieks
Appealing vain, the crimson-whetted blades
Of maddened soldiery, devouring life
And all its treasured stores with tongues of fire.
The Gohil Rajputs.
When in the twilight of a short repose,
New forces fed by nature's clemency
Arose to lift the land from sickening gloom
And eastward where Saurashtra's sea*board held
The prospect of a future rising trdde,
Above the forest glads of Sihor's hills,
In radiances rose the moon of faith; her rays
Of peace, on wings of glorious hope,
Went furrowing the darksome dreary soil
Bedewed with warriors' blood and women's tear*
2$
When nature held communion thus with time,
All of a sudden, riving twain the wakened sod,
Sprang forth the glorious Gohil sword in hind,
Commanded by the universal God,
" Go Heal, " and Nature, in vibrations strange
And rarely felt by man, echoeql, " Go-heal"
To go abroad and heal the wounded land,
And wreak his vengeance on the woes of war.
And thus the Gohilas, Strong Sons of Earth,
Moon-born, symbolic of their rule by love,
With hearts of mettle, tempered, valliant, high,
And firm in friendship, fierce on battlefield,
The Gohil Rajputs founded Gohilwad.
The famous hero of the Gohil race
Renowned for valour and for statesmanship
Was Sejakji who had his capital
At Sihor, cradled in the ancient hills
Where harmless hermits meditating dwelled.
There, winding by these hills to wash their feet,
In bounding waves of limpid waters, flows
The gurgling Gautami, of sacred name,
In memory of that sage divine whose fame
For Vedic lore and Universal Law,
Eclipsing modern thought, sustaining shines.
And there beneath the hallow of such high
Associations wrought of saintly minds
And nature naked to her creed of love,
The true foundations of the Gohil Raj,
About the year eight hundred and twelve
After Lord Christ of sacred memory,
When auspicious stars ascendant shone,
Were laid by their ancestral hands*
H* H. Sir Bhavsinhji II
And twenty. eighth in line from Sejakji
Of, ancient fame, renewed Sir Bhavsinhji
Hails enriched with royal blood and skill
To steer the trying ship of royalty.
His noble father, himself a link between
The olden days and modern spirit high,
Forestalled his Heir-apparent's future call
And trained him for ideal statesmanship,
Which now is amply justified by him;
His genius takes his council by surprise
In matters simple or momentous oft ;
And trusting various posts to trusted heads,
He rules his country as his own household,
A Chauhan Princess of an ancient line
Of Ddvgadh B&riya of old Rajput fame,
Within the wide domains of Saurashtra,
His Royal Consort was his sole rejoice,
Until she bore a darling crescent bright;
Their Royal Palace rang with love, a short
Decade of truest faith and constancy. .
The purest harem of her virtues great
( And not of queens as eastern monarchs have, )
Delighting kept the royal lover's life.
Example of a Sovereign true, until
She Heav'nward journey took with saintliness-*
The sole regard of her devoted life*
30
The Princess.
A child she was of tender delicacies,
But trained in nature's way to run and play
With lap-dog puppies, and the cheeta cubs,
With cooing pigeons, rabbits, frisking lambs,
And bounding gazelles, golden antelopes,
That had their homes within the Palace grounds,
Where feathered- watchmen-peacocks kept the watch
With clarion-notes, or flew the topmost trees,
Their signal- posts, with trains of trailing glories,
Or spreading wide in love their velvet robes
Of wondrous rainbow-hues, forgetful danced
Their mates to draw, in joy of summer clouds.
The Princess now would keep sagacious watch
Upon a brood of chirping little ones
Below the ceiling in a crevice dark,
The mother-minah fetching milk-white worms,
To feed her fledgelings while the male-bird sat
Attuning sweet, the Gdyatri of birds.
Or now below a shady neem-tree full
Of yellow fruits, the sweet desert of parrots
The playful Princess smiling seat herself
And twing her cithar to the tune of birds,
And call the bulbuls join in choral songs,
Or she would steal inside her garden-walk
Alone, with silk and needle and watching scan
The cunning spider weave its subtle webs,
To tempt the careless fly within the net.
And suddenly, as if a challenge given,
Her fingers with electric nimbleness,
Describing curves and lines, produce irt waves
Of deep and blushing hues, from rim to nave,
Carnations fresh with petals blossomed wide,
31
To tempt the humming bees to seek her bells*
Heroic too she often dared to be
When fearless heart did take her playful steps
To tamed leopards, in the Palace grounds,
For she would pass her dainty little hands
Upon their open hungry jaws, or pull
Their collars, pat them saying " Pretty dogs,"
For she was after all of Gohil race !
And when her Royal Sire returned home,
She oft would draw him to her company
And yield him sweet repose from serious thoughts,
And show him what her studious fingers did
Clay models, pencil-sketches, silken blooms,
The sun and moon were subjects of surprise
How in the western skies the wandering sun
Did lose himself to rise again next day
In fresh apparels on the Palace trees
At day time where the moon in secret hid,
And stepping through the raven locks of night,
To awburn changed and then to molten gold,
She shines the queen of starry t space above,
The wondering eyes below and oft doth Riss
The virgin clouds who blush in her embrace,
And set the zephyrs free in summer groves,
And brings the children's feet to dance to tunes
Of innocence and youthful jollity.
Or she would put him questions far above
Her age and thinking, of the world of stars
That shone above in liquid radiance,
Or she would ask him if the soul of her
Departed mother went to the highest Heaven
Of which the stars were silver lamps,
3*
A Prophetic dream,
The Princess one day had a wondrous dream:
Parading on a silver cloud an angel came,
While she was playing on her cithar fine,
Below a banyan by a river's bank,
What time the setting-sun ^declining drew
His radiant darts within his golden sheaf.
And drawn by music stood the grazing cows
With funnelled ears and nostrils opened wide,
A petted peacock danced to peahen's love,
And while the bosom of the running stream
To ripples broken, sweet sensations felt.
Now slow desending from the silver clouds,
The angel drank the purest melody
From ruby lips of beauty's roseate cup.
And her presented with a rosary
Of diamonds five of liquid radiance.
No sooner than she put it round her neck,
Cither and angel vanished like her dream ;
And when she woke up from her dreamy slefip,
The running brook and diamonds vanished too-
And she alas within her Palace rooms !
And rith her open palm as if she held
The precious gift, the Princess dreaming sang:
r< Cithar and angel vanished like my dream,
And when I woke up from my dreamy sleep,
The running brook and diamonds vanished too"
O what are dreams in nature's lap of rest
And dreams in breathless wakefulness of life,
Or hours of innocence or inward light,
When our soul's being balanced in repose
Attuned to nature's harmones, perceives
The distant gleams of future loom on dim
And mighty ridges of eternity I
33
SONG BY
i Vrajkunvarba.
Parading in glory aurora's above,
And the birds on the meadows awake in. delight,
And the breezes in gardens are kissing, in 1 love
The roses with Panna's Best Diamonds abright
2 Prabhavatu
And the helmets of heroes are shining in light
And their chargers are prancing to trample the foe f
And the King of the heroes is crowning the sight,
In his armour of Pannd's Best Diamonds aglow.
3 Vasantba*
Now the gold of the evening is melting abright
And the cliffs of the mountains are fading above,
And my Princess is seeking the shelter of light
In the Palace of Panna's Best Diamonds of Love.
4 Bhuvneshvaru
Now the pastornal maidens are humming in love
And the pigqons are cooing the coming of night,
And my Princess is counting her beads in the grove,
And her beads are of Panna's Best Diamonds abright,
5 Bhanumati*
And the moon in her fullness of splendour delights
And the music of maidens are thrilling above,
'And my Princesses dreaming and dreaming she writes,
"Q my hesu?t is for Panna's Best Diamonds
34
The Sunderbagh Palace*
There gleams upon a hilly mound afar
The solitary roof of Stmderbkgh,
Reflected on the glassy bossomed mere
Whose undulating marge, from hill to hill,
Extending bounds the landscape to the skies
A summer home inviting royalty,
Protector of the hamlets lying round,
A beacon-light of huntsmen and their gamer-
She rears a queen enthroned, alone and high
Amidst the sylvan beauties of the wilds
And glades whose verdant slopes retreating merge
In the long waters of the winding lake,
Like phantom clouds arrayed in forest shrubs.
What mem'ries cling to thee, thou Sunderbagh,
Of comeradeship of kindred souls in love,
Of lovers' compromise or courtship's blush
In consummation's cup of brimming joy !
Or led, perchance, by fancy, many a child
Of nature, loves to haunt thy sacred grounds,
Thy Ions retreats beside the water's edge,
Those island-hillocks, or the humming groves;
And stretch at ease upon the matted banks,
His mind attuned to the song of rippling waves
And spin his mellow dreams of human life
With webs of gentle breezes passing by,
The sweetest chirpings of the minstrelsy,
And fleecy wavelets fleeting in the sky.
The Victoria Park*
And from the shady levels there below
Receding far in waves of green and grey,
35
Extends the wilderness, Victoria Park!
O how its wooded depths in deep embrace
Of hillocks, wolds and jungles running wild,
Upon the couch of stillness slumbering seems,
Awakened often by the bounding deer,
Or swift gazelles or black-bucks beautiful;
And oft the feathered-watchmen, peacocks blow
Their bugle-signals which echoing far
And chorussed by the frightened minstrelsy,
Go tingling in the stillness of the air.
Ye wild inhabitants in bondage free,
Your artless beauty naked, nature-clad,
Your love of liberty to fly or roam,
The azure sky your roof, the turf your bed,
Your sportive limbs and looks of innocence
Your heritage from god, beloved by man,
Secure your death by admiration shot.
O beauty, soul-enchanting love, thy doom
Subsits in thee alone, in man or beast
A blooming rose bud or a bird of song,
A pet lamb or a simple maid in love,
Doth oft convert one's heart to one's <Jwn grave,
As glow worms light the very dens of death,
Decoyed in darkness by ingenuous birds;
Yet life is real, tho' in it death abides !
A Soliloquy.
How soft the sun descends the crimson stairs
Of sovereignty in heavens; and slow the clouds
Break into countless mirrors glassing forth
The fading splendours of a summer day.
And in the calm despair of ebbing light,
The intervening twilight's melting haze
Affords a ? safe retreat to homeward herds;
Behold yon <flying string of birds on: 'high*,'
Thefr azure tracks in concert how they wing;
And what manoeuvres-wheeling arcs and angles,
Now look a garland-trophy blown by gales,
Now like* a hooded cobra winding go,
The minstrel heralds of the rising moon,
Alone, resplendant, bright and beautiful,
And in its wake, behold the Evening Star,
How calm and bright she comes a blushing bride"
The woods seem hushed to rest.-The breezes hum;
And now the water-fowls like sheets of clouds
Of darkness, cackling seek the hollows scooped
In thickets of their isles of bushy reeds.
How nature's brush reveals her passions e'er
In glowing hues and tints of softer grace;
What chisel sculptures restless in the dark
Within her mystic womb, those evolving shapes,
Elaborate and perfect, vast and fine,
Surpassing strange the utmost stretch of thought;
And crowning all, Thou source Divine, Eternal Law,
Thy cosmic scheme engenders self-creatihg power,
Life throbbing fills, O Lord, Thy universe,
Love rippling bounds in ever increasing rounds,
Light gleaming dances in eternal suns,
In everything, O God, abideth Thou !
The Betrothal*
The Princess' dream was prophetic and true,
The sibyls fair of classic fame reveal
To natures pure and simple, the things to be*
Because the fame. of her accomplishments,
The bardic songs of ancient Gohil Chiefs,
37
nt 'Ruler sage -like rule, with
Nciw travelled far and wide And many a- Pritke
Was proud to seek the Princess* worthy hand.
Her father was of one determined mind,
Regarding pedigree and culture true,
And not to barter his beloved child,
To titled image of a ruling chief,
Or empty vanities of hoarded wealth.
And happily the Princess' merits too,
Were of a higher type, beyond compare,
Demanding thought and wisdom in the scales
Of meting out the future to her share.
And so it was a mighty test to all
His Councillors to give him advice meet;
Dewan Prabhashanker Pattani,
Whose name as source of wisdom-yielding light,
And passing current as a household word,
Renowned for statesmanship made His Highness
Revolve it serious in his royal mind
Of sense-enticing gold to vices prone,
Of wealth of wisdom born of noble blood,
&
Of kinship of the souls ennobled by the Creed
Of heritage, of one's own happy stars,
As problems of eternal love in earthly life,
In nature's law of wise economy,
The best survives for higher ends, thro' all
The vast turmoil, in silence deep entombed.
As clouds are fringed with radiant silver-tints.
When lightning flashes hide and seek with th*m,
So, many famous names of worthy chiefs,
Did flash their hopes, till like the moon
In full effulgence shines, and thus adores
3*
The azure vault of love-enamoured heavens,
So Panna's Diamond, lighted in the hearts of all
And yet divinely pre-ordained, the choice,
Of kinship fell in one unanimous voice,
Upon a young accomplished worthy Prince
Of Panna, blessed land for diamonds famed.
The Festive Capital,
The city rolled in splendour and delight
The walls were coloured in luxuriant tints,
T-he pillars twined with flowers and ferns embraced *
From end to end with wreaths of gay festoons;
And sprightly buntings .vied with torans
Of mangoe- leaves; before each threshold in
The humming streets, with bosoms heaving high
In em'rald billows, stood the plantain trees,
With plumpy fruit arranged in layers close,
Revealed the humane touch of nature's hand
And artless naked to their ever-opening buds
That yielded worship earthward ever bent;
And their luxuriant flags of verdant leaves
Abovfl them waVing to the whispering breeze
Invited Ceres hold her carnival
To 'welcome spring. The watered floor was decked
With sweet designs of women's workmanship
Of India's ancient art, with powdered stone.
Triumphal arches, Indo-Sar'cenic
In build, with ctipolAs, and arches rare
Of ancient Delhi-work, with twinkling rows
Of multi-coloured lights and flashing globes,
And merry banners bounding in the breeze,
Uplifting all the grandeur below,
Arose at five receding centres, in
39
Ascending glories of artistic skill,
Till beauty stayed to dream at Mothibagh.
The Bridal Morning,
And waking earlier than his wonted time,
The sum came chasing sweet the am'rous moon
And filled the universe with loving light
And now the minahs woke in melodies,
The city pigeons wheeling went on high,
The parrots' prattle stirred the dreaming groves,
The little bul-buls sang their matinees
To join in chorus with the chanted hymns.
And bridal blessings from Takhts^h war's fane
When morning breezes set lit liberty
Impatient roamed to scent the sunny skies,
What tiny brilliants from the petals of
New-opened flowers did slip and slide below
The Palace gardens and deluding drew
The peacocks whose trumpet notes, echoing far
In loveliness, declared the bridal dawn.
The Procession to Nilambagh*
^
So when the grand procession moved along
The bowery roads, the gorgeous coloured robes
Of silk and lace, of silver and of gold,
Displayed the multitudes as moving beds
Of sweet carnations, brilliant hued,
And women and children in their proud array
From balconies, appeared like butterflies
And glow-worms, struggling in the wondrous blaze
Of lights and singing sweet hossannas to the Lord,
To Wess their Krishna and his Royal Bride.
And reverence to the sovereign as the aim
40
Of loyalty by Vedic retuals taught
And tingling in the blood of Indian life,
Now rose in tidal waves around their throne,
And filled the city with delight and woke
The twinkling stars that stood ammazed,
At the sea of wondrous blaze of lights,
'Midst which, our Panna's diamond -lustered Iord 7>
Sree Yadavendra, shone a bright Pole Star
Of faith and hope and love of Bhavnagar.
They spoke of him alone, his royal mien,
And painted him as well as love can paint,
And called him sweetly, gave him many names,
Till one sonorous voice went ringing on,
" Behold Sree Krishna seeks Sree Radha's hand."
And tears, reflecting gathered stood in full,
A father's tears, at the brink of love and hope
To see the vision of mysterious life
And love in silence lurking everywhere
In fleetness faster than the lightning's dart
Conveyed its message lost in ecstacies
To Nilambag's Palacial Court where thronged
The Royal Household round their Gohil Gem
Who ravished beauty in her bridal air.
It was indeed a sight of splendour rare
And when it reached the Gangajalia's bank,
For beauty set on beauty, spent themselves
In triple glories by the blazing tank
Whose bund revolving shone a cataract
Of flowing gold. For once Sree Yadavendra thought
A rival procession seemed to converge there;
To out-bid which and witf the bridal wreaths
For his ' Mahendra and his country's love,
41
The honest mahout, speared his elephant,
Upon which like a moon alighting down
Encircled by a myriad blazing stars,
Sree Yadavendra, in traditional-
Robes of Sree Krishna, dear to Indian hearts,
Sat beaming full in beauty's brilliance,
Himself enamoured, and enchanting all.
The Wedding*
Amidst the Palace mansions on a spot
Selected for its comeliness, they built
The bridal mandap robed in draperies
Of Japan silk; the lintels flowed with gold;
And pillars bright with inlaid work of Ind
Revealed their myriad hues, thro' tender leaves
And blossoms of the creepers twining them.
The roof seemed cut out of a summer sky,
When th' sun, through dappled clouds, revels in gold,
For thro' its niches rimmed with strange
Filigree work of gold and silver tints,
Electric bulbs flashed forth their wondrous lights !
And in. the middle o'er the marble floor
With India's richest carpets spread, arose
The golden Bajrath^ bright and beautiful,
Begirt with fancy fringes, in designs
Of sweet " Forget-me-nots, " in threads of gold.
The sacred fires with fragrant offerings sent
Their odours pure, along with chanted hymns
By Vedic Brahmin elders calling for
Paternal blessings from the God on high f
The Royal Couple's hands, through Vedic rituals
Emancipated from reliefless hope,
When at the time the Star of Constancy
42
Stood searching on the eastern skies, to kiss
The silver fringes of her hiding moon,
And earth and heavens, shared the sweet delight
Of glory waking music's ecstacies,
And seemed to meet for very joy of life
Within, divinely common unto all
So at this sacred hour of bliss divine,
Their Royal Hands did meet in love supreme,
The Celebrations
at
The Albert Victor Square,
Behold with glee and jollity,
The Albert Victor Square,
With lightning sheen and laurels green
Delight in music's choir.
Behold its " Welcome, " Good-night " tell
Of Magic lights to be,
As maiden's cheek, in colours speak,
In maiden fancies free !
With penons fair and beauty rare,
"The Victor Square delights
If Stars have come to witness them,
The splendour of the lights !
The Indian May Pole*
The scene is changed, they are arranged,
The Indian May Pole round,
The damsels seem in sun-set gleam
With hope and beauty crowned;
Like angels come, in sweetest hum,
In melting melody,
43
With magic wands, in dainty hands
In maiden-liberty.
And from above, in streams of love,
Revolve the silken ropes,
As they begin to dance and spin,
The Rain-bow of their Hopes.
The Lota Dance*
It was a sight, a wondrous sight,
For all to see the fair,
And pretty lasses' smiling faces
Hail the Royal Pair !
And one by one, in silken gown,
They come abreast in rows,
Upon each head, as soft they tread,
A LOTA in repose.
With bangles rolled, of silver, gold,
Their dainty hands resound,
As feet to feet, they wheeling meet,
Delighting stamp the ground.
They wheel their course, in twos aod Jours,
And move as breezy-bowers,
Forget-me-nots, their sweetest lots,
Or beds of singing flowers.
And heel to heel, around they wheel,
And make a merry ring,
Aside they glance, to time their dance,
As they begin to sing:
"The air is cool and beautiful,
The sun is shining bright,
The birds that fly, in air and sky,
Are warbling in delight*
44
Our darling flowers, within their bowers,
Invite us to the lawn,
So let us sing, in merry ring,
Of the Bridal Dawn.
Sree RADHA is our Love, to please
The Bridegroom of the Day,
Sree Krishna dreams in beauteous beams,
Our Love to steal away.
Our life is short and we depart
Our Love for ever grows,
And doing good, our Womanhood
In Godliness repose.
The world is kin to all within,
The earth and sea and sky,
So let our Love be sent above
To worship God on high ! "
The Departure*
And so it came to pass, Sir Bhavsinhji
Had after all to part with his sweet child
Whom sixteen summers, like full sixty years
Of thoughtful culture, guidance pure and stern,
A perfect woman made, her father's pride,
Above the vanities of wealth and rank,
Devoted, true, compassionate and good.
She felt at" once her Consort's royal state
And as a Queen to maintain what was hers;
So when she came to bid farewell to all,
The simple child of Nilambag, stepped in
With added graces fine, a perfect queen.
She saw the courtyard where her pretty feet
Rang meny chimes to sooth her loving sire/
Present a touching view; her garden-walk
45
Appeared in sad distress ; when came at once
The thought of leaving all, the woman in her
Betrayed her tenderly and choked her breath,
A thrill of wild sensations shook her frame.
Her early days of childhood, books and games,
And days of innocence and sweetest ease,
Her music-classes, and embroidery
Her lady teachers, Governess and her mates,
Were all exchanged for functions grave and meant
For public good. She henceforth was to lead
A life of anxious care, with meet regard
To her beloved Lord, his Royal Mother,
Domestic elders of his Royal House.
Her spirits rose to higher altitudes
Commanded by the presence of one in whom
She found her mother lost and every wdy
Her good step-mother was so much dear unto her,
She knew not what was loss, but grew in love)
Firm as a sapling with a newer branch;
And both were mother and child, of rooted faith
In the name and honour of the Gohil Clan.
And now the mother of her woman's heart
Was shaken earlier than her age allowed,
To part with her, the only daughter of
Their Royal House and earliest pledge of love,
Whom oft they called " The Gem of Nilambag. "
So loving bands when lovingly held forth,
The Princess, like a wind-blown flower slipped
Upon Her Royal bosom, bathed in tears.
iThe noble queen courageous Consort of
Her 'Worthy Lord, consoled her pretty child,
As mothers often do when infants wake
4 6
From fearful dreams And sweetly told her,
c ' Thou must be a Queen, not let the child
To play thy feelings into failing grief,
My child, my darling, be a Rani dear,
And wear the Diamond-Love of Panna fair
Within thy heart to pangs of gfief be hard,
But glow with virtuous lustre to thy lord,
To whose renowned and heroic line thou be
A fountain of increasing progeny,
And Gohil Beauty Panna-Diamonds breed 1 "
But deep with within, His Highness felt, unknown
To other minds, sensations of a hard,
And writhing pain that parents only know.
He calmly stood and serious composed
Amidst a flood of feelings that like a toy
Toss up and down the pigeon-hearts of men,
Till round and round its eddying waves,
They wheel in blank despair and moan of fate.
His mettle was put to test on many a grave
And -sad occasion and proved its pithy worth:
Whenofamine smote his people down like leaves
In winter by its biting winds from north,
His faith in God grew stronger, as these woes
Were meant for some ulterior good and his
Ancestral sp'rit of charity, emboldened went
To feed the homeless poor and aidless sick,
For in the bounding pulse of public weal,
He read the soundness of a healthy State,
Symbolic virtue of a sovereign mind.
He braves the lion in its Indian Home
Of Gir the only forest which the Lord
Of Beasts, majestic, beautiful, hath made
47
His envied home in Asia's wide domains;
And at his Palace Nilambag a herd
Of belted leopards couchant keep the watch.
And when he lost his little son, then only son,
( Takht^shwar, live our Heir- Apparent long!)
His wisdom met the mishap half the way
And told his councillors " We live in him,
And nature executes His Law divine,
Wherefore taint the eyes with tears, or hands
With sin, but seeing His decrees are shaped
To glorious ends, our thoughts must terminate
In goodly acts and nature thus be served."
Now like a weather-beaten boulder by
The sea-side, where the angry breakers rise
And dash themselves in vain, to tiny sprays,
So calm, collected, wise beyond his age,
The Royal Sire was to all his subjects dear,
A good example of greatness unassumed.
E'en he was moved, for when his jewel bright
Of Nilambag, his heart's own sweetest child,
His earliest pledge of love his "Mind's Delight"
To ask for her beloved father's, kind
And holy blessings, stood before him, witft
Her vieled head embosomed hung, but half
In sorrow, half in maiden-bashfulnes,
Jast as a sun-flower droops at even-tide
So e'en his trusted courage melted by
The virtue of his own humanity.
The very apple of his eye was now
Departing like a ship on snnny seas !
And as he held his child for once, for e'er,
His pent up fealings broke their brimming dam
And shook the man in him to tenderness
And pathos deep for who could stem the tide
Of nature's flow of feelings which alone
Make man divinest prototype of hers I
4 8
Paternal Blessings*
Patting his proudest Gem, His Highness said:
4< If aught you owe to my partnal care
And our ancestral blood, and if thy mind
Was fed in nature's creed to love thyself ^
The least, but serve the higher ends of life,
Reflect thy measured -thoughts to wholesome deeds;
Thy very breath as nature's owfc, translate
Itself into a voice of loving peace,
In social system, law and government.
Thy aim shall be to give, to yield, forbear
When selfish motives, the purest vision blind,
Because it is by her increasing gifts
That nature grows enriched, fresh and green.
" The womanhood famed of ancient land-
Sweet SITA, Type of Virtue, Truth Divine,
And SAVITRI too of undaunted Faith,
Inspire thee, Daughter, at every step of life-
How for royal Nala, DAMAYANTI'S love
Ennobling burnt in virtue's snow-white flame,
And CHANDRAMATI'S constancy reached heavens
Like frankincence with Harishchandra's Truth.
The glory and the hallowed sanctity
Sorrounding these jewels of Aryan life,
The heritage of India's women are,
And hine like Beacon- Lights in the Sea of Life.
Thy Royal Consort is henceforth thy Lord,
Thy trusted friend, parent, everything,
Thy soul's own image slowly come to thee;
Thy priceless Jewel through whose radiance
Shall glow your beauty, love and virtue, nay,
Thy very life of sweetest womanhood.
In him behold thy image, in thee, his love,
To quote the words of ancient Vedic lore,
. f< In man^ let woman behold the universe^
In woman> man his indeah implant^
And man and woman thus united, as
Is sweetness and the substance, ever shine
In the radiance of purity divine* "
49
An Acrostic Birth-Day Ode,
To,
His HIGHNESS MAHARAJA RAJA SAWAI TUKOJI RAO
HOLKAR OF INDORE STATE IN DO RE.
Holy Nandy guards the gates of Kailas mountains
crystal zone,
Holy Nandy brings His blessings to the Holkar's
honoured throne.
Trust in God and peerless valour, led thy noble fathers
bring
Union midst the motley masses, warring madly for
a King,
Kingless India wept in darkness, waiting eager for
the dawn,
Kingless India's eyes were smitten when her saviours 1
lances shone
On her mountain ridges blue and flashed the signal
of her peace,
Jolly sailors rode the billows of her rolling stormy seas,
' India, India/ rang their voices, "India our Immor-
tal Prize,
Rise thou ancient Land of Wisdom, Britain greets thee
India, rise,
Ancient land where cosmic law was based upon the
love of God,
Of a holy union linking God with man, the world's
applaud !
Hoary land of valiant heroes, doughty deeds and
glorious dreams,
Of thy crystal walls of mountains, melting into
rippling streams |
50
Land which; cradles virtue on. thy lap: of selfless
sacrifice,
Kinship with the starry regions, in thy dreams of
love, descries."
After days of hardy warfare, Britain's banners guard
our Home,
Roost in peace our lawns and woods where cattle graze
and tigers roam.
On Britania's India falls the light of truth to wake
from sleep,
Falls on sovereigns, like thee, duty, England's heritage
India reap.
In thee, pregnant with our harvest, future Indore's
pulse doth beat
Ne'er in India's annals did a nation welded, freedom
greet,
Dewy freshness of thy Birth-day, blossomed on our
hearts to glory,
Of thy four and twenty summers, on November's
thirteenth day,
Royal message for thy children, danced in peace upon
thy brow
Emblem of our ancient faith, Halkar's rule is rule of
Love!
Memorial Ode to the Jain Temples
in Gujerat,
Immortal shrines
-Of holy men whose -dreams
Of love divine > portray the gleams
Of ^higher life; what glory, shines
On monumental fones beaming bright
5*
With ancient memories of a noble race
Whose clergy robed in stainless white,
To a vow of silence bound
Their wisdom with contentment crowned,
Inspire us with their holy grace.
Immortal architects of yore
Imbued with selfless zeal did pour
Their heart-blood into living piles
Of crystal walls and golden aisles,
Where music bursteth into showers,
Of hope's enchanting lotus flowers,
Where human love seeks to be
On faith enthroned with ecstasy;
Where meditation's mellow light
Like moonshine wakes the soul's delight-
Like moments vanish earthly ties
And human love melts like ice,
Where love divine eternal runs
Ablaze in streams of thousand suns.
Ye sacred haunts of saints concealed,
Ye famous fanes of faith revealed,
%
Ye rocks of virtue, streams of love,
Ye winding flights ascending high.
Devotion's ladder to the sky,
Ye hoary temples ever shine,
Like beacon lights of Truth Divine,
Ye wild retreats
Where silence greets
The weary soul
To seek the goal
Of being and to be,
Of immortality !
5*
Ye ancient Abu hills
Ablaze with burning love that fills
The cup of faith to overflow
In streams of sacrifice below,
How bright
Your marble portals ope,
Their glowing hearts to Heaven's light,
And feed humanity with hope !
How soft
Your tinkling bells resound,
To raise the sinking souls aloft!
With wreaths of amaranth crowned,
Ye temple walls of truth sublime
Entombed in halls of hoary time,
Shine, shine for once,
For ever shine,
In full effulgence
Of purity, divine !
To,
K. V, M.
A Vision Young India.
Slow and steady courts the sun, the blushing
west with burnished gold,
Slow the far off lands are wakened, into streaming
radiance rolled ;
Soft the world is bathed in breezes, filled with fra-
grance worship yields,
Nature wears her bridal robes, in rolling seas and
emerald fields.
Life is ever full of glory, life is constant in ,its
change*
53
Life is not the breath of folly, lost in doubt or
seeming strange ;
Life is rich with mines of wisdom, life is fed by
love supreme,
Life is action, radiant mercy, ' life is not an idle
dream ' I
In the dream of coming glory, in the haze of
rushing lights,
I, an infant dreamer saw the shining nations scale
the heights
Saw them march in earnest zeal to where their
Master silent stood,
Hoist their flags of love and glory, preach the law
of brotherhood!
Rose the moon of ancient wisdom, flooding all the
spotless skies,
With her light of winning glories, rousing life in
billows rise
Great and glorious was her gospel flashing from
her learning's shrines,
India claimed her brilliant jewels from her ancient
wisdom's mines.
Flashing sword and fiery canon, flung her arts to
dust and shame,
Till the growth of ancient knowledge went out like
a flickering flame,
And the songs of early poets, hushed in silence lay
asleep
Covered in ashes lay her wisdom, vedic love lay
buried deep.
India loiters far away, her tender feet are Wet with
gore,
54
Vedic India, far renowned for her ancient veclic
lore
" Fallen India'' thought the Master, " Great in deeds
of Love shall rise,"
India, India, " rang the heavens, " India, World's
Immortal Prize. "
India in her summer heat of ceaseless warfare faint-
ed lay,
Till the clouds of enterprise came marshalled in
their proud array;
Freedom laden breezes sent them, from the far
Atlantic seas,
Till the showers of their wisdom, wooed the woeful
land to peace.
Faith in God and valour in them, made the
Merchant-Kings to hold.
Even balance in a land where race and creed in
madness rolled.
Thunder-belted heroes came, with lightning in their
cartridge-rolls,
Naiterl the lands to iron-girders and the skies to
magic poles,
Slow their steaming six-wheeled-boiler, carried
culture through the land,
Well their magic magnet needles held their language
in command.
I then dreamt another dream, a dream of happy
days to dawn,
India growing young and healthy, England's diadem
brightly shone-
Then thfc Master's earnest wishes beat their thunder
in my soul,
55
Then the lightning-flash of wishdom, lit the passage
of my goal.
There I see a happy vision, lifting me to
altitudes
Of a higher world of knowledge where the future
wistful broods,
Sphinx like, radiant gleams the vision, floating on
Eternity,
Poising on the wings of time and breathing out
humanity.
On her face the riddle of life in silence hangs, the
worlds to shake,
And her lips in silence kiss the music of the soul
to wake.
There before this mighty vision radiating love
abright,
Like a speck of dust I floated, on the rippling
waves of light.
Sonnet*
It is the gift of genius e'er to meet
The wise and noble promptings nature yields
To man, thro' insight born of strength which wields
The radiant darts of thought for purpose grand ad sweet!
The starry heavens with loving wisdom greet
The fragrant zephyrs sing the song of peace,
In mansions, humble huts or shady trees,
The world is thus, with wondrous things replete.
As nature, wealth of hers, in man descries,
So man, thro' ar.t dramatic, paints the chancy
Of human life and reads his own defects.
Upon his lively screens his skill relies
*And on his stage the crowded moments dance,
Hfe seeks in wisdom what his sense rejects!
56
To
Y M. S,
Alone, on the Himalayan Heights.
The night displays her raven locks,
The starry world is set in gloom,
The crescent pale behind the rocks
Of Gulmarg* tears her wintry tomb.
Athwart the highlands, far helow,
Some wild bird sends its lonely song,
Where whispering streams in woodlands flow,
And wandering breezes moan along.
In solemn stillness beats the heart
Of nature waking awful dreams,
Of blasted hopes and fears, to thwart
My spirit tossed in whirling streams.
How awful, lonely is this spot,
And awful still the moaning breeze,
Alas more awful is my lot,
A shipwreck on the stormy seas.
This solitude which sorrow loves,
This night in darkness deep embrace,
This rock-built home of dreaming groves,
My comrades in this awful place*
And like a stag who stands at bay,
A lonely cloud swept off by gales,
A pilgrim who hath lost his way,
A ship with tempest-shaken sails.
t In the Himalaya Mountains, Kashmir.
57
A thatched dwelling on a scar,
When tempests shake the root ariditree,
When furious billows are at war,
With rocks and winds for liberty!
Alone I stand, alone I feel,
The. future flickering fries from me,
Atid awful thoughts within me steal
Where nature breathes in jftajesty !
wild and native love of self,
O warring creeds of wasting life,
O wayward throes for power and pelf,
O woeful man, O world of strife!
In vain our human love implores
The faith of mankind to its clan;
In vain the minstrel parrot pours
Its songs to please the faithless man*
And man is not what man should be,
Nor was he meant for merriment^
And what is not humanity
Is humane yet, he is content.
And what is life, to eat and drink,
To quench the heat of thirsty birth ?
And what is love, in lust to sink,
And drown the soul in dtefcy mirth?
To
HIS EXCELLENCY LORD HARDINGE,
Viceroy and Governor-General of INDIA.
Birth-Day Ode,
With rarest joy our hearts are welling,
The fountains of our love are swelling
In surging floods of worship dwelling
Within our hearts of meek humanity;
And from Himalayan heights above
Our summer zephyrs cool thy brow,
And India's Heart is warm with love,
Thou chosen Star of British Sovereignty!
O Him the giver of our day,
With gratitude for Him we pray,
In this thy gladsome natal lay,
To guard thy life, thou son of sternest duty!
If truth is sweeter than all creeds,
At\d,/ove of duty honour breeds,
And faith in Him to glory leads,
Thy truth is love, thy faith is breathing beauty !
When Delhi's Pageant swelled with cheers,
What clouds of gloom, brought sudden fears,
And India's eyes were wet with tears,
For thee, thou Mighty Britain's Star sublime!
O how at His Divine command,
And from a dastard's cruel hand,
Thy life was saved, to save tour land
From branding her with ban of brutal crime 1
59
With patience rare, and voice yet fine,
Thy forgiveness was all divine,
Our hearts were drenched with eyelids' brine,
To see unchanged thy heart with kindness gleam;
We have our faith, my Lord, in thee,
And ancient India shares in free
The progress of humanity,
With England's glory, British Power supreme*
Away ye notes of jarring creeds,
Of sect and caste which meanness feeds,
Avaunt ye wrongs of ruthless deeds.
Let India's genius bloom by Britain's might;]
Our land with women bred as slaves,
With customs, creeds, in madness raves.
Ye psuedo-martyrs dig your graves,
Let India's Ancient Wisdom come to light.
Ye zealots of an alien creed,
Your frenzy sows the evil seed
Among the thoughtless of your breed,
To plunge this land of gods to perilous doom*
My country's young men be not led
By wildest dreams on frenzy fed
To bfe on martyrs 1 myrtle bed,
And drive this peaceful land to depthtess gl&nfc
And is it martyrdom to make
A peaceful race to rashness take,
And racial froth to billows, break,
Of, build your fortress witk mere stacks of straw ?
The seedlings grow to plants in time,
The seasons come in turn to chime
With nature's music, sweet, sublime,
That gradual growth and order is her law.
Ye patriots who hope to see
Your land in nations' comity,
In league with all humanity,
Let spades be skilled in art, and spindles, free 1
And .there are helots in our land,
Whom we should walk with hand in hand,
And ours will be. a noble band,
Inviting peaceful growth, not anarchy,
p
Let factions set their feuds aside,
And priestcraft weaned be of its pride,
And lettered men by ploughshares ride,
As4 rid the fields of India of their weeds.
Let labour seek its own reward,
And comtjionsense be on its guard,
And curbed hah^ kiss the^ sward^ ,
Awi I hail thq, harvest of your golden deed$,
Ye Christian, Moslem! Parsee friends*
Ye Aryans, ( your bard this message sends
United stand for higher ends,
And all as Indian Sons, united bej
And wave the Union Jack on high,
On field and city let it fly
Proclaiming in the sunny sky,
Britania's rule vouchsafes equality!
Be true, my India, true for e'er,
To what they thy ancient faith bids fair,
Thy amaranth myrtle-wreaths to wear,
Behold He comes to guide thy destiny !
With Krishna's Love His canopy,
And Budha's Duty, guide to be,
The Light of Christ's equality,
The Master comes to lead Humanity !
Accept, my Lord, this humble rhyme*
A hamble token of the chime
Of India's loyalty sublime,
From Young India's youngest humblest bard;
Young India in her loyalty
Evolving higher, prays to be
A, link in British sovereignty,
By * providential mercy . of the Lord.
62
ADDRESSES TO YOUNG INDIA.
DEDICATED WITH FILIAL GRATITUDE TO
Sreeman Munuswami Raju of BasavangudI, Bangalore,
Whose searchlight of wisdom always led me to climb
Bolder heights in the realms of nature.
+
I
AN ADDRESS
ON
THE HIGHER LIFE*
Delivered to the students of the Bahuddin College
under the Presidentship of^ames 2eott Q ?*
MR. PRESIDENT, GENTLEMEN & MY YOUNG FRIENDS:
If there is any place in Kathiawar which will
lend its beauty and inspiration to a discourse on the
Higher Life of man, it is this and this place alone,
hallowed as it is with its antiquities of religion and
history $nd the superb grandeur of the ever-dream*
ing peaks of Girnar which draw thousands of devotees
to its ancient and beautiful mountain shrines. Stand*
ing almost at the foot of these time-honoured hills
and drawing the very breath of life and the ispira-
tion of ages, I congratulate myself for the oppor-
tunity given to me by our worthy and respected
President to address the youth of Junagadh on a
subject of supreme importance concerning the very
soul of our being. But it is a subject to do justice
to which, however feeble I may be, I am sanguine
that in my discourse to-night, 1 shall not be found
wanting in earnestness of purpose, zealous faith in
humanity and unbounded love to the Universal Spirit.
The problem of life is the problem of problems
which stands for ever sphinx-like, inspiring awe and
grandeur and baffles the greatest of intellects when
they attempt to solve its purpose or unravel its
mysteries. No thinking mind and no hungry and aspir-
ing, soul can ever rest satisfied without endeavouring
to solve the riddle of life. It is at once so simple and
yet so perplexing that at times in our higher flights
of thought we are carried away into some mysterious
regions where speech fails and wisdom reigns supreme.
In one of these moments of thoughtful frenzy, I one
day happened to ask my Guru Maharaj, " Pray^ Sir>
tell me, what and where is life? " And he an adept
and a true representative of the old Aryan School
of Philosophy in his usual laconic style, sometimes
paradoxical and sometimes mystic, replied to me taunt-
ingly thus *' Pray, tell me, what and where is not life?"
The meaning of those words are now apparent to me.
This beautiful universe in which we are, at^any rate,
we find ourselves breathing and moving and living, is
rippling with life, though the manifestation of life may
differ in degrees in different things. From the mineral
kingdom upwards to the vegetable and animal king-
doms, we see the same life, governed -by one immut-
able law uutil wading higher upwards we reach the
masterpiece of nature the world of man, in whom
development and manifestation have reached the pin-
nacle of grandeur and glory. Man is often called the
lord of, creation, not for the actual life he leads at
present, but /or the possibilities of realization of the
64
ideal of life involved in him. I do not propose to
take your young and tender minds, to-night, into the
usual and perplexing labyrinth of metaphysics, but
confine myself to things which are simple and plain
to every one of us to lead a higher lifet It is not
.possible for us to think of life without a material
body and the human body has much to do with life
as the human life with the body.
What a piece of wonderful workmanship is our
body! Look at the beauty, symmetry and the com-
plex mechanism we find in its formation. How the
human skeleton, a compact bony structure, is held by
bands of muscles and bound by ligaments of cartilege
How the blood vessels, the arteries and veins, carry
nourishment to the body and remove waste-matter
from it-How the respiratory system purifies 'the im-
pure venous blood into crimson streams of life-How
the nervous system spreads its ramifications through-
out the entire body to control the muscles and to
carry messages which strike us with wonder 'and awe
as to ho f yr the brain wills and the heart feels! This
body of ours is really a wonderful instrument of God,
the grandeur and glory of which, we do not often
recognize. If we love the life we live on earth, if
life is worth living, if there is any noble purpose or
grand truth involved in living it, then it is quite ac-
cessary that the abode of life, the Temple ; of God>
must receive our reverence for its functions and seru-
pulous care for its up-keep. It is to inspire you, my
ydung friends, with that veneration and attention to^
wards your bodies which are essential to create a high
ideal of life in you, at the first stage of your careers,
65
tfiat I selected this all important subject, for through
my experience as a teacher and as .a humble student
of sociology who always kept in view the conditions
of growth and progress! of the youth of our country,
I invariably found that the neglect of the body al-
ways led ultimately to the corresponding degeneration
of mind as well as spirit.
I therefore exhort every one of you to maintain
the native strength and vigour of your manhood
through the bodies in which you inhabit, without
which life on earth will have no meaning. It is* up-
on the canvas of a healthy body that the soul can
write the picture of life The better the canvas, the
more perfect the picture. The human mind among the
generality of mankind, has gone on studying various
things in nature and the light of human intellect has
made its way into the innermost depths of nature,
until at last, the study of man by man, in these days
of electricity, magnetism, aeroplanes and what not
the study of mankind by man, has been laid aside
as a subject which does not require any^ special
thought over it.
Read, for instance, the ancient histories of Greece
and Rome. How their pages glow with heroism and
valour! You will assuredly notice that those great
nations did not lose sight of the harmonious develop-
ment of the body -and mind, the proof of which we
find in the high ancj lofty thoughts left to posterity
by t their thinkers and divines and the beautiful speci-
mens of sculpture now extant as models of muscular
power and superb beauty. A sound mind in a sound
66
body was their maxim of life. The same maxim ought
to be our ideal. Until these nations kept up the
standard of bodily vigour as a nation, they prospered
as rulers of the then known civilized world. But when
once they began to descend.down from the high peda-
stal of true life, they too were sjvept away by the
waves of time, as our own ancient India was after
its palmy days of pomp and power, which preceded
the period of the Great Mahabharatha War. All of
us are aware of the universal law of the survival of
the fittest; and the immutable law of nature judges us
from the stand point of Body, Mind and Spirit. *
Let us not give our thoughts to idle fancies of
fate and Karma and allow our lives to be shaped by
events and circumstances. I want every young man
present here to build up his manhood as a tower of
strength, nay, it is the sacred duty of every one to
consider that the perfection of the individual is the
perfection of the state or the glory of this universe.
In the economy of nature, everything has its own
use and more so with man, in whom nature has laid her
vast store of possibilities with ample scope for deve-
lopment and growth. Nature tests our strength by
its thunders and tempests, the storm and stress of
life. Our ambitions, desires and needs always keep
smouldering within our hearts to burn us down to
ashes. Every pleasure has its own pain and our
loves and hates and sorrows are sufficient enough to
play shipwreck with our lives To stand the buffets
of life, we must be strong in body and mind aftd
spirit. I therefore exhort every one of you to build
up your bodies as citadels of power and strength,
6 7
with the full consciousness of their importance, to
achieve your ideals so that the symmetry of form,
vigour of the muscles and the sta mina of the nerves
may be in harmony with the standard of beauty,
symmetry and strength in nature.
How beautiful is the world in which we live,
with its blazing sun, the resplendent moon, and the
twinkling stars with its mighty ridges of mountain
barriers rising tier over tier artd dissolving in the
skies with their masses of pure white snow Nature
wearing brilliant colours and beautiful forms in the
tints of the meadows and the view of the landscape-
The song of birds The fragrance of flowers and
foliage -spirit vieing with spirit form with form, lavish-
ed with beauty within and beauty without, this world
of ours is beautiful indeed ! And what is the position
of man in the midst of the beauties of nature, as her
representative and masterpiece of wisdom and intellect,
who is entrusted with the sacred duty of reconciling
thought with action, ideals with actualities and offering
the flowers of wisdom to the beatitude .o^ the Soul?
Not in the visionary dreams of the world to come,
do I wish our life to be spent away, and not in spin-
ning thoughts in darkness, of the miseries, Calamities
and tribulations that beset the brief span of life,
should we allow our noble energies to be frittered
away. But facing every situation manly and meeting
every problem boldly, with the deep consciousness
pf the divine purity that pervades our spirit, our
youthful lives should ba consecrated to the service of
humanity. We build temples to worship God. We
68
Hold them in reverence, consider thdm to be holy and
sacred* But what about our own temples-the living,
breathing and moving Temples of God ?
Without any disrespect or disparagement to the
sanctity that surrounds every such place of worship
which is built by man, stone over stone, brick over brick,
with pillars and beams, niches and windows, domes
and cupolas, with gateways and porticos and even a
thousand-pillared hall, and far within, the holy of holies,
the innermost sanctuary is consecrated to the Diety
with piety, devotfon and worship beyond expression.
Man's piety, man's devotion, and man's worship has
made it sacred. For there in the silent hours of our
lives, by meditating deeply of faith and love in the
world, we gather strength to fight the battle of life
Out of silence comes forth the voice that inspires us,
houses us to action and takes us back to our native
pristine glory and links our soul to the Soul of the
Universe. Wherefrom doth that voice emanate ? Which
is the real source of that light which comes kindling
our drooping arid despairing spirits to glow with life,
love and wisdom. Yes I hear the whisper of every
soul in this hall. Yes I hear it emphatically answered
by some responsive hearts that the voice comes from
within us. It emanates out of this temple in which God
has lodged an infinitesimal ray of his mighty spirit with
limitations to be transcended, wisdom to be achieved
and perfection to be personified.
How can any man respond to the call of suth
a high mission in life as this, if the constitution c of
his body and mind, is not tuned to suit the harmony
of life around him 1 In $hort, the music of bur life
6 9
must blend with that of nature so that we may draw
our inspiration from her and thus become conscious
of this infinite power that dwells within us and justify
our existence in proportion to the knowledge we
possess of God, nature and man. For instance, of
all the sentiments which the human mind can give
expression to, the expression of gratitude is the noblest,
the purest and the most sublime. Nature furnishes us
with many examples in this direction. Even beasts
and birds supply us with innumerable examples of
their acknowledgment of this bounty in nature, not
to say of the offerings of fruits, nuts and flowers in
her. To return our gratitude to the Giver of
bounties is an act noble and inspiring in itself.
Can this temple of God serve as a medium of ideals
to be aimed at on this earth, if it is not sanctified
by purity of character ? You must be fortified by high
and lofty thoughts. You must send out to the world
abroad, thoughts of peace, and love and goodness. I
am afraid that I am taking you into what may be
called a mere dream of life. Yes I acknowledge that
it is a dream that I am dreaming, but a mighty dream
indeed! It is the dream of an idealist to live the
Higher Life of Man. Since my earnest purpose to-
night is to hold up a lofty ideal before you, I exhort
you not to think for a moment that you are mere
life-draggers, dragging your burdensome lives from
birth to death. You are men of thought, men of in-
spiration and above all, men of action- men whose
pdfentialities are really astounding, riding as you are
over 'the powers of nature the steam engine, electric
cars ahd aeroplanes 'inventions which inspite of 'their
;o
wonderful comeradeship with the genius of man, are
nothing when compared with the awe-inspiring myste-
ries of nature which man has yet to fathom out in
his higher flights of life.
The age of oppression and tyranny is gone. The
age of sectarianism is fast dying^ away. Under the
aegis of the British Sovereignty whose imperial flag
has brought along with it peace, security and freedom,
be it acknowledged to the glory of England, that a
new era is dawning upou us. I see its glimmer
slowly lighting up the horizon of thought. Behold! It
is already shining on the ridges of mountains that
mark the Highways of Culture. Yours are the temples
which will be flooded with this light of the coming era.
You are going to be the fortunate artists who
will enjoy the special privilege of painting upon the
canvas of time, the picture of Young India, beautiful
in expression, free and bold in delineation and rich
in colours of wealth and wisdom.
You are going to be the.heaven-inspired poets who
being efidowed with the seeing eye of beauty, love and
hope, shall once more take your sallies into the my-
steries of nature and singing the song of awakening
India, the morning song of life, wake up the divine
souls lodged in x the living Temples of God.
You are the future thinkers and philosophers
who will hold forth the torch of truth and brandish
it once more to the nations abroad that India is born
again to hold its own place in the comity of religions*
You are the architects and masons, the farmers
and artisans, in fact the future "de facto" labourers who
7*
will demonstrate the motto " Labour omnia Vincit?
labour conquers everything. Whatever may be your
vocations in life, you are the actors on the stage, in
dawn of the coming age.
The benevolent genius of the British nation has
set in growing forces at work with the result that
the stream of Indian Reformation is slowly corning
in confluence with the stream, of what may be called,
the Indian Rennaisance and the confluence of these
two streams, swelling into a mighty flow, is flooding the
vast continent of ours with new hopes, new impulses,
and new ideas. Is it not then your duty to make your
temples worthy of this high mission in life ? From each
and every one of you must emanate thoughts of
unification, thoughts of peace* This is the period of
your preparation to befit lourseives to the duties of life.
And in this period you must gather knowledge and
mould your character. Never allow yourselves to be
guided by fanatical or destructive ideas. Lay the
foundation of character and culture and build up your
manhood with the principles that govern the right
conduct of life. Of such principles, four 'stand fore-
most in my mind, representing as it were the facing
sides of a building. We should have unbounded Faith
in us. Our character must be established on the
firm basis of Truth. Every act of ours must be- sea*
soned with Love. The whole conduct of life must
be guided by a spirit of obedience to higher autho-
rities. Faith, Truth, Love, Obedience. Let these four
wards be ringing in your minds, not ears. Remem-
ber them in the building up of your temples. Think,
feel, nay, dream of them and weave them closely
and inextricably into the web of your being* When
such virtues as these are assimilated into the system
of your thought, you will see that out of you, will
spring forth, thoughts of a constructive and benevo-
lent nature, free from passion and doubt, frenzy, fana-
ticism and gre6d. Out of purity cometh purity, out
of blessedness cometh blessedness* and man poising
on his pinions of glory ought not to tread upon the
dung-hills of envy, hatred, jealousy, lust and avarice >
but soar above and breathe in the higher altitudes of
humility, wisdom and peace. Let me draw an inspira-
tion fron Nature. Nature's law is one and im*
mutable. Nature's love is supreme. In the kingdom
of nature there is no taxation for our needs. The
gentle cow, symbol of motherhood in India, lives upon
grass and in return serves man with rich milk. The
apparently insignificant silk-worm feeds on the coarse
mulbery leaf and tears its life away into threads of
silk. The plants drawing their nutriment from the
earth and enjoying the essential influence of sunlight
and air, put forth foliage and flower and fruit, each
with its own peculiarities of colour, taste and use.
The birds send forth their jubilant songs distilled
through the vernal blooms.
And glorious indeed must be the life and
production of man
Not hatred but love^
Not anger hut forbearance^
Not avarice but charity >
Not falsehood but truth,
Not pride but humility ',
Not rebellion but obedience^
Not war but peace \
73
II*
AN ORATION
ON
The Culture of Manhood and Character.
Delivered to the students of Jamnagar under the
Presidentship of J^handixbhai J)dsai &$%*., Direc-
tor of Public Instruction, Nawanagar State.
PRESIDENT, GENTLEMEN AND MY YOUNG FRIENDS:
I am indeed thankful to our worthy President
who as the Head of the Educational Department of
the State of Nawanagar, gave me the opportunity to
deliver a series of lectures to you on the theory of
physical culture combined with a course of practical
training in the various exercises, based on scientific
principles to develop the body and mind in such a
way as to secure mental efficiency and vigorous health.
This series of lectures having come to a close, I pro-
pose, to give to-night a finishing touch to my work
in your midst, by summarising the salient principles
that go to build true manhood and high character
in man whose heritage is this whole universe of ours
teeming with beauty and life.
Behold the rosy dawn, with its cool and fragrant
breezes opening wide the very portals of Heaven !
Behold the crimson sun-set gleams that bewilder and
astonish your hearts and leave your wondering minds
to dream of the glories that departed from the western
skies ! The innumerable stars that shine through the
dark curtain of night, suggest worlds of new thought.
The moon comes bathing the world with beauty and
love, The flowers lay bare their very hearts to re*
74
ceive the worship of man and the grateful trees laden
with fruit, pay him worthy homage. The green fields
and the gurgling streams, the glassy lakes and the
happy valleys, the wooded hills clothed in vernal
gowns of beauty and freshness and the mountain re-
gions receding higher and higher, ,till they culminate
in one ascending snowy mass of unapproachable purity !
These and many hidden powers in nature, are the
birth right of man who is at once the crown and glory
of creation ! In him is to be seen the concentrated
picture of the beauties in nature expressed in their
minutest details of construction and character, in him
also resides the wonderful power to enjoy, admire
and worship the bounties in nature and the eternal
glory of God. Nature lends herself to the use of man
if he only opens his heart unto her influence.
We are all divine by nature. The human body
may very well be called the temple in which divinity
<f lives, moves and has its being. " It is equipped
with a beautiful but very complex system of machi-
nery, a sfcudy of which will lay open to us, a new
world of wonder and mystery in nature, with its
millions of cells, leagues of blood vessels, multitudinous
sensory nerves and ganglia, and the various other
internal organs, not to speak of the wonderful propell-
ing motion of the heart and the guiding mastery of
the brain. From what I explained to you in my
classes about the structure and functions of the various
organs of the human body, I am sure you are in a
position to appreciate any knowledge concerning o'ur
own bodies and the conditions upon which the healthy
growth of body and mind depend. Let me summarise
75
a few of the leading facts relating to this subject
for the convenience of those who were not present
at my lectures, so that they may not only follow
my discourse to night with interest, but also be tempted
to pursue a leisurely study of the subject. Nature in
accordance with her well-known characteristic feature
of combining economy with utility, has built the body
of man with about 200 distinct bones forming its
bony framewortk, arranged in a compact way with
grooves and joints, allowing motion and movement.
This bony structure gives the human body, shape and
firmness, protects the various delicate organs in the
body, affords attachment to the muscles, and lastly
the bones serve as levers. The skeleton is covered
and tethered as it were, with about 300 bands of
muscles and ligaments of cartilege and the whole
structure is covered over by the skin. There are
two cavities-the thoracic and the abdominal cavities-
the former contains the lungs and the heart, the
latter the various organs of digestion and excretion,
such as the liver, the stomach, the kidneys, the
intestines and bladder. In our limited** 4 study of
the human body, we paid special attention to only
a few of the important and prominent muscular bands,
such as the biceps, the triceps and deltoid of the
arms; the trapezius, the neck muscle; the latissimus
dorsi and the rhomboids on the back ; the major and
minor pectoralis or the chest muscles ; the serratus
magnus, on the sides under the arm-pits; the thigh
and calf muscles in the legs and so on. The nomen-
clature of these muscles is, as I pointed out to you,
in my evening classes, derived from some prominent
character which the muscle presents, such as its
situation ( tibialis ), use ( flexors, extensors ), form
( deltoid A, trapezius, rhomboid ), direction ( obliquus ),
attachment ( sterno-mastoid ), or divisions ( biceps,
triceps ).
Besides these bones and musples, the human
body consisits of a great number of different parts,
delicate and complex in structure, called the or-
gans of the body. Each organ does, not only, its
own peculiar work, but acts also in harmony with
the work of the other organs. It is in this feature
of each organ having a distinct work of its own and
yet working in unison and harmony with the other
organs, to secure the healthy, orderly and simultaneous
development of the body and mind, without interfer-
ing with the function of its neighbour, or failing to
warn whenever there is any breach of the law of
nature, it is in this wonderful working of the human
mechanism, we decern the mysterious hand of God,
our Maker.. Each organ is composed of millions of
cells and gt.group of organs concerned in some common
work, forms a system. For example, the group of
organs consisting of the heart, arteries, veins etc forms
the circulatory system. The respiratory system consist-
ing of the trachea, the bronchial tubes and lungs,
carry on the work of breathing. The digestive system
composed of the mouth, the stomach, the liver and
pancreas and intestines is concerned with the digestion
of food. There are the other systems, the excretory
and muscular systems. But the most important of tfil
and the most complex in structure and functions is
the nervous system, consisting of the brain, safely
77
located in the bony cavity of the cranium; and the
spinal chord running through the vertebra of the
spinal column and sending its ramifications of nerves
to the farthest parts of the body insterspersed with
nerve centres or ganglia, carrying messages to and
from the brain and in fact controlling and regulating
the functions of all the other systems.
Over and above this complex mechanism, there
is what is called the vital principle which we ought
to study with wonder and admiration. From the
amoeba or protozoa, living creatures without mouth,
stomach, muscles and nerves, in which the tentacles
can move, seize and devour food, to man, the most
complex of all, with a number of separate and dis-
tinct organs, for every want and purpose, with ceils
that reason and thinlf, that is, from the first traces
of animal life to the highest and the most developed
forms, we see the same spark of life, the same vital
principle, stirring everything into animation and inun-
dating the whole universe with the wave of life. What
this life is, what its characteristic features ^are and
upon what does the duration of life depenHs, are
questions of momentous importance which require
separate discussions by themselves. It is sufficient
for us to note that life depends on consumption
and restoration. Let us, in the limited scope of our
discourse, examine the food that is necessary to main-
tain life in a healthy state and the other subsidiary
conditions that are favourable to prolong the duration
of 1}fe. Now first as regards the food of man, there
is a world of discussion among doctors and divines,
and also amongst the ignorant masses who are guided
78
more by customs and habits rather than by human
reason or natural instinct. Some are in favour of
purely a vegetarian diet, some in favour of animal
or m>xed diet; while some others are after fruits and
nuts. But all are agreed to the essential ingredients
that go to form the ideal food, namely, Proteids or the
muscle-forming foods, Carbohydrates or the sources
of energy and Phosphates or the nerve-developing
substances. It is in the choice of our food products
we descern the wisdom and intelligence which our
time-honoured ancestors, brought to bear upon this
all-absorbing question of food.
" We think our forefathers fools, so wise we grow,
No doubt our wiser sons will call us so."
Our ancestors were sagacious persons indeed!
They have placed at our disposal the best food pos-
sible under the state in which we live, taking into
consideration the climatic conditions, material pros-
perity and moral or ethical precepts. It is not in any
way necessary for us, at our present period of junq-
ture, to go in search of ideal food either to be manu-
factured out of the existing things or to be discover-
ed anew. All the ingredients that are considered to
be essential for the needs of humanity are found in
abundant quantities in the most common things of
our garden, meadow and market. Most of the vege-
tables, grains, an 4 green fruits contain starch] milk
and fruits contain sugar, nuts, beans, milk and ghee
contain fat\ vegetables, nuts, peas, beans and other
leguminous seeds contain albumen; ripe fruits contain
peptogens which also abound in broths prepared out
of peas and beans. Out of wheat, rice, barley, rye.
79
maize, nuts, Dholls ( Thowar, Moong and ooduth )
horse-gram (Chenna), vegetables and milk, ghee and
curds out of these, according to our need and con-
venience, we can select our food-material to satisfy
our need and repair the waste in our body. This is
not the place for me to digress into the subject of
flesh-diet. I take it for granted that most of you in
Kathiawad are vegetarians and there is absolutely no
need for me to expatiate upon the merits of the creed
of vegetarianism, except this statement from me,
namely, that it is a fallacy to consider that meat-diet
or mixed-diet, is a necessity to acquire strength or
for the formation of a strong nationality.
From some of the modern Journals of the Vege-
tarian societies in foreign countries, we learn to our
satisfaction that in the various tests of strength and
labour and endurance capacity, it is the vegetarians
that broke the records of their flesh-eating compeers.
This remarkable evidence of the athletes is streng-
thened by the more valuable testimony of the octo-
genarians who always maintained vigorous ^ealth of
body and mind and lived over eighty years. My
earnest appeal to you, my young friends, is that out
of the ordinary Indian meal, you can get the health
and strength you are in need of, provided that you
select your own food-meterials properly and attend
to the minor, yet not the less important, principles
of life, principles such as the quality of food, its
proper digestion, regularity in taking food, the num-
bef of meals etc. Let me dilate a little upon the
question of digestion of food. How many of you
chew the food properly and allow it to be mixed well
8o
with the saliva in the mouth ? Very few indeed !
A great number of stomach complaints amongst the
students can be traced out to the negligence of observing
this simple, but important safeguard in the process
of digestion. You should, as the old saying goes,
drink solids and eat liquids^ that is, by the act of
chewing, the food you take, must be reduced into a
liquid condition before it is swallowed and likewise
the same with the liquid food. Let me tell you in this
connection that there are five distinct organs that
aid the process of digestion at different centres.
First in the month when in the process of mastication
the saliva which is an alkaline secretion comes in
touch with the food, it converts the tasteless starch
into sugar known as maltose and dissolves the nu-
tritive salts contained in the food you take. The second
place where the same food is being acted upon is
the stomach, in which certain glands pour out an acid
fluid and others pepsin, which both together form the
gastric juice, which has the power to dissolve proteid's
or albiyninous substances into peptones which pass
into blood. The gastric juice has also the character
to prevent putrifaction of the contents of the stomach
and destroy germs. And lower down the same food
is being acted upon by another juice called the bile
issuing out of the liver which digests the fatty matter
of the food by emulsification. The bile aids absorp-
tion and stimulates intestinal activity and prevents
the injurious effects of the gastric juice on the mucous
membrane of the intestines by newtralising its acitiity.
At the fourth stage it is attacked by the pancre-
atic juice coming from the pancreas which does, not
Si
only the work of the aforementioned juices, but digests
raw as well as cooked starch. Then comes the last
course of digestion in the intestines by the intestinal
juice which acts upon all the remaining food elements
and digests cane sugar. Thus you see that the five
important food elements viz. starch, proteids or albumin-
ous substances, fats and salts and sugar, are acted upon
in the process of digestion by five kinds of jqices, from
five digestive organs as it were.
But how far do we co-operate with the work of
nature in the proper digestion and assimilation of
food into our system ? I know that most of you
students whose attention is drawn towards the school
or college bell at n o'clock in the morning, take a
hasty meal, gulp down your food, drinking mouthfuls
of water in the course of the meal and put on your
dress and reach your school or college doors, sweat-
ing and breathing hard. Seeing that healthy food
has the power to vitalise and renew the living subs^
tance of the body, you must take your food in the
best of spirits, calmly and contentedly, without allow-
ing the worries of life to cross your mind.
Take only two meals a day. The morning meal
must be taken clearly at least half an hour before you go
to the school and the evening one, two clear hours
before you go to bed. Keep the stomach empty in
the morning before you have your mid-day meal
This is an excellent device to induce natural hunger.
Tea and coffee are the most contested beverages of
thd. day. You derive absolutely no benefit from these
drinks. It is highly desirable to give up entirely these
luxuries of modern civilization. If you cannot, you
$2
can limit their use to two times a day in very mode
rate quantities. But there are good and effective
substitutes to these drinks, which are purely Indian
in character and congenial to a tropical climate. One
kind of it is a decoction of Dhaniya (coriander) seed
with a little of sonth (dry ginger), with milk and
sugar. The other kind is what is'called Tkandaiin
one form, or Hareera in another form, but both pre-
pared out of almonds, ground well and mixed with
n>ilk f sugar and water, to which may be added a little
of ginger and cardamoms.
Sleep.
Sleep is the essential factor of renovation and
reconstruction of life. The physical effects of sleep
are that it retards vital consumption, affords rest to
the limbs and organs of the body to recover from
their state of exhaustion and ushers our existence
every morning into a new and refreshed life. "Take
from man hope and sleef>> and he will be the most
wretched being on earth." Too long continued sleep
is again a sign of ill-health. We should give about
6 to 8 hours for this necessity of life and sometimes
one or two hours more, when completely exhausted.
Remember the well-known maxim, " Early to bed,
early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise."
The rooms in which you sleep must be airy, roomy and
high. The light must be very dim. They ought not
to be damp and dusty, crammed with furniture, rags
and old rickety things. The beds you sleep en
must be even and hard ones. Never sleep on soft
cushions or spring-beds.
83
When abed you should be in almost a hori*
zontal posture and not in a forced or curved one.
The head must rest on a soft pillow. Sleep with your
feet to the east or west. This no doubt has some
reference to the electric or magnetic currents, passing
through the earth, the truth of which, perhaps, is yet
to be published or discovered by the modern Re-
search Scholars. Again never sleep in the supine
posture, that is with your back resting flat on the
bed, with your face upwards. This exerts pressure
on the vertebral column and at the same time inter-
feres with the measured flow of the blood and free
and uninterrupted breathing, and causes a disturb-
ed and dreamy sleep. This posture is good when you
want to take rest after severe exercise or exhaustion,
for a few minutes, known as {< Relaxation Exercise,"
with your limbs thrown loosely on either side of the
body and breathing deep and slow, till you get relief,
The best thing is to sleep sidewise with your left
hand resting below; and sometimes you may choose
the prone posture, that is your chest touthing the
bed. Sleeping on the left side does not hinder the free
working of the heart, on the other hand it not only
aids it, but it is also highly physiological. This position
in the early part of the night helps the abdominal
organs of digestion to carry on their work uninterruptedly
and free without, compressing them and aids the liver
to pour the bile into the intestines where it joins
the stomach. Sleeping on the left side, you will
notice that you breathe in and breathe out through
your right nostril or Surya nadi as it is termed in
our Yoga Philosophy, The Surya nadi or the Solar
84
Pole is the heat producing channel which during
sleep aids digestion, destroys useless accumulations,
repairs the waste in the body and restores freshness
and energy. For reasons similar to what I have been
telling you, it is desirable that long before you leave
your bed, you should sleep on the rjght side, to allow
the left nostril to do its work of cooling the body,
for it is known as the Chandra nadi or the Lunar
Pole. This posture helps the intestines to move their
waste matter to their lowest end and thus prevents
constipation, and the cooling breath of the Lunar Pole
does not allow internal heat to increase. Always,
whether during sleep or wakeful hours, breathe through
the nostrils.
Avoid the baneful habit of studying in bed and
reading till you fall asleep. Never sleep in a sitting
or reclining posture, which causes the body to form
into an angle. Employ the day for labour and study
and the night for rest and sleep. Are we wiser than
nature? Nature opens the great and imposing shop
of life with the fresh beams of the rising sun, the
fragrant breeze of the valleys and mountains and the
music of the winged-minstrels. Morning represents
youth; noon, manhood; and evening, dotage. You
should therefore wake up early in the morning and
draw your inspiration from the fresh heavens and
smiling lawns, for noble conceptions and exalted ideas.
Remember that even plants have a period of rest
and repose. This sort of rest or sleep is an essential
factor of life. The duration of life depends upon per-
fect or imperfect restoration. What is spent in living
an intensive life is lost in extension. The less in*
85
tensive the life the longer its duration. Sleep is sus-
pension of intensive life. In these and many other
respects there are several things to be known by the
student class to secure health, which is the source of
all enjoyment of life. Bearing in mind the fact that
we take food to produce energy and sustain strength
and at the same time to repair the waste in the body,
we must, as I told you at the onset of my address,
consume such materials as are conducive to the pro-
duction of heat and energy, and to the development
and invigoration of muscles, nerves and brain. Let
it be ingrained in your young minds that the masti-
cation of the food you take is very essential and
bolting is very injurious; that you must eat little and
digest more; that quality is more important than
quantity; that moderation in food is a very necessary
virtue; neither eat after- taking vigorous exercise, nor
take exercise after eating; neither take your meal be-
fore you have natural hunger nor eat a morsel more
after natural satisfaction.
Add to these simple instructions, the pecessity
of keeping the body and dress clean and fresh. Re-
member well that certain complaints of the nose can
be cured and the cooling of the eyes and brain can
be secured by drawing in draughts of cold water in-
to the nose, alternately, through each nostril. Wash-
ing the face and eyes with cold water often during
the day time is also very good and healthy. Stu-
dents should have sufficient light in their study rooms.
Light must come from the sides or from the top and
at the same! time, the glare of the window or sunlight
falling on the page you read, must both be avoided.
86
During night time, students should never attempt to
read with .insufficient light or smoky lamps. Nor is
it advisable for them to read in a lying down posture
with the page they read from, overhanging their eyes,
this position being though seemingly comfortable on
their beds, is yet very unnatural and injurious to the
eye-sight.
Exercise*
The culture of the body is as important as the
culture of the mind. Hence the period of youthhood,
when the mind and body are plastic and are fit for
unfoldment and development, when tastes and habits
are acquired and muscles and organs of the body grow to
their fulsomeness, the period of youth is the best period
for culture of all kinds. There is a certain power in
us which is capable of being ^expanded and develop-
ed, which, if left to itself under the influence of the
ordinary routine of our hum-drum existence, will tend
towards degeneration, rather than expansion and frui-
tion. Applying this principle to the subject on hand,
I am convinced that physical culture based on the
best and approved scientific principles will give strength
to the limbs, elasticity and vigour to the muscles
and motion and grip to the joints. It also prevents
mal-growths, such as pigeon-breasts, hollow-chests,
drooping shoulders, stooping, spinal curvature, one-
sided development of the body and stunted growth.
There is an immediate effect of exercise on the
thinking faculties of the brain and you will be asto-
nished at the quickness and delicacy of the connec-
tion. Professor Park, an emineril psychologist says:
S7
"'You cannot separate body from mind any more than
you can separate the stalk from the flower, the body
is as vital to the mind as the stem is to the blossom."
To gain the real benefits of exercise, it must
not be taken spasmodically; it must be regular, sys-
tematic, proportionate and natural. Even the plants
and trees in nature may be understood to have their
share of exercise, being shaken by the breeze from the
root to the top, including the tender stems and leaves.
In taking exercise the most important point is to bring
the mind in touch with the muscles and at the same
time to bend and stretch the body in a natural way
without any implements whatever. Take up any por-
tion of the body, the arm for example and in giving
exercise to it, you must concentrate your mmd on
the various muscles and fill them with the spirit of
your will. Exercise given to the whole body in this
way for about fifteen minutes, without producing fati-
gue or exhaustion, will be stimulating and refreshing
in character. Heavy weight lifting is bad as it is a
strain on the nerves. From various experiments car-
ried on by specialists in this field, it was found out
that a man's memory is in proportion to his physical
condition and that in proportion to a decrease in vita-
lity, the mind also became sluggish and that in the
universities, the body-builders took the highest place
and maintained their health throughout in life, where-
as the weak and ' emaciated genius, either gave way
later on or was a cripple or died early. The ideal
system of exercise to keep the memory at its best consists
in a combination of walking and indoor exercises
based on natural principles. Add to these suggestions
88
the need to take deep breathing exercises in open
air, in healthy localities, such as the mountain-heights,
sea-shore, garden walks, or river beds etc., that is,
taking slowly as deep a breath as possible and after
retaining it for a very short time, to breathe it out
slowly and gradually. A good system of physical
exercises based on natural and 'scientific principles
taken regularly day after day without bringing on
exhaustion or fatigue combined with the invaluable
aid of deep breathing and with your mind fully con-
centrated upon the task of growth and progress, such
a method as this, ought to crown the youth with
vigorous health to secure the enjoyment of life, robust
strength to discharge the functions of life and a fer-
tile brain to wield the sovereignty of thought.
Loyalty,
In my book, entitled the "Science of Perfect Life/'
I have gone deeply into the various problems that go
to the formation of true humanity without clashing
with the ideals set up by the spread of modern thought
Under the benevolent rule of the British race who
have done and are doing more for us than we are,
in our own interests, doing for ourselves. It has al-
ways been my chief aim whenever I had an occasion,
to correct the views of my young friends, the students,
as regards certain mistaken ideas that are passing
current in their young and tender minds. It is decidedly
a matter of ingratitude on our part to think ill of a
power that has been and is a source of the natipn-
alisation of our creed-worn and custom-ridden land
of sects 3fld castes, And considering that the moral
8g
rectitude of an ancient people whose loyalty to thesdve-
reign power and fidelity to their ideal of virtue, have
sunk deep into the life of the whole people, to be
ungrateful as individuals to the uplifting influence* of
British sovereignty, is to bring on ourselves the con*
demnation of history that we have no character*
What is worse is, to be ungrateful as a nation, a thing:
which will leave its indelible impression on time that*
the India of the sages and and rishis is to-day the
India of thoughtlessness. It is after centuries of progress,
earnestness of purpose, identification of interests and
unity of spirit that nations have advanced. My young
friends allow yourselves to be guided by the verdict
of history and setting asid3 all such high problems
which are beyond your province, make yourselves
men of character and trust.
Character*
You are young and the very traits and tastes
acquired during this period, are carried forward
in advanced life as ' k the child is the father of the
man/' Your chief aim shall be to lay the foundation
of true manhood and true character. Grow to become
men first and then leave the rest to the conditions
and possibilities of the future. It is with our experi-
ence of the past and a knowledge of the present,
that we go on carving the figures of life from the
quarry of the future. Remember that a healthy body
is the best soil for the growth of a healthy mind and
that a healthy mind produces healthy thought and all
tfiese three combined together form a good man. Be
that your ideal of life. Never aspire to be noisy
patriots, Patriotism consists iu the annihilation of
90
what is personal in favour of the good of all; to stand
for truth and justice; to help the poor and the crip*
pled; the labourers and the ignorant masses; to suffer
the pangs of poverty, and be prepared to be abused
and columniated by a host of social lies and selfish
creeds., Dont talk of patriotism. It is too sacred to be
purchased in the noisy market of greed and avarice; lust
of gold and power; and conceit, vanity and slander.
Leave patriotism aside. Be men of character and true
manhood. Love your fellow beings. Render service
unto humanity. Live in truth. Stand by the suffering
and poor; sweep away all kinds of social evils that
are gaining ground in the name of God and religion.
to demolish priest-craft and cunning deception. Friends
ipay forsake you. Relatives may treat you with con-
tempt. Hunger may pinch you. Want may consume
you. Fame flies away from you. Conspiracy, columny
and cunning are at your heels. But what of that?
You are here to do something good which lies in
your power. This hour has need for men like you.
You are the image of your ideal. Tread firmly upon
evil timcjs. Bear the standard of sincerety and walk
forth boldly and firmly, with the cross of Christ on
your shoulders and Budha's bowl in your hands !
India welcomes you. You are the world's Man.
I want heroes of this kind from your ranks. Heroes
that will bear the standard of truth to expose savagery
and sham> to trample down ignorance and imposture
to vanquish mock heroes and persue patriots. I
want heroes to lay the foundations to build the Uni-
versal Temple of Peace, with manhood and character.
Heroes to create love for the true dignity and birth-
right of man. Heroes of truth. Heroes of virtue atad
heroes of universal humanity and unbounded love ! ,
91
III
AN ADDRESS
ON
"The Function of Poetry*"
Delivered to the students of the Samaldas
Bhavnagar, under the Presidentship of 2 a
<?*., M. Ak Principal.
GENTLEMEN,
We are in the very manhood of summer. The
fields and meadows are gay with many a golden sheaf*
The flowers send their innocent fragrance through the
swelling breeze. The feathered minstrels are Jubilant
to hold their carnival of love this very moment. A
new light and a new charm seems to fill the whole
world and overflow in streams of shimmering gold
in the West. Nature has gone mad with joy to find
the thrill of youth and beauty overpowering her sere-
nity and solitude. In the distant fields, the solitary
pipings of the shepherd-boy come distilled 9 through
the vernal blooms and classic fame. This is the hour
of inspiration and delight-the hour when the mind oi
man liberated from the thraldom of creed and dogma,
can afford to take a sally into a vision of dreams
where the future of mankind reveals itself in the
dimness of the distance^ in mystic symbolism. It is
therefore with a' new delight that I take this oppor-
tunity, on your invitation, to sp6ak to you a few
wofrds of the function of poetry in the life of mankind,
as it is supposed, ;on mistaken grounds, that poetry is
not a thing that may be considered as ah essential
9*
factor in the education of man or the progress of a
nation.
The age in which we live is indeed an age of
great scientific achievements-an age which has sur-
passed the expectations of the generality of mankind
oh account of its astounding inventions, wonderful
discoveries and patient research in the vast and infi*
nite field of Science, This is an age which on account
of its versatile productions and applications of scien-
tific principles, has raised the material comforts and
conditions of man and has also opened vistas of a
very 'hopeful future in multifarious directions, to ele-
vate the race of mankind to a status higher and loftier
than the present one, in short, to make man, a most
wonderful being-a being who will fly over the clouds
without wings and visit the stellar regions, as he does
any continental port now in the far off seas.
The aeroplane is already cleaving the aerial re-
gions of the gods. The dreadnoughts and torpedoes
are the veritable scourges on the sea. To the won-
derful aclfievement of the wireless telegraph, the great
Marconi perhaps is adding the still more wonderful
achievement of the wireless telephone. Science is all-
dominant to-day and does not hesitate to sacrifice life or
energy to achieve its end. Man sits in his snug office-
room, and gets the news of the whole world. He is
likewise able to communicate with the farthest corners
of the world. Man's thirst for knowledge, man's thirst
for discoveries and inventions, are all directed towards
the acquisition of power over natural laws and agents,
towards securing the material comforts of life, rather
than towards the solution of the true function and
93
purpose of life. Human activities and energies seem
to be marshalled towards the domination of one race
or nation over another, rather than the joint efforts
of all in searching out the ultimate goal of life. I do
not stand here to-day to speak in disparaging terms
of the various improvements in arts and industries
that have made our lives, happy, prosperous and en-
joyable. I do not, in the least, think of the triumphs
of scientists, with a light heart or compromising con-
tempt. I view them with genuine pride and venera-
tion. I hail them as the sturdy forerunners of a more
hopeful future.
Yet in the midst of plenty and power, beauty
and love, nay, glory and grandeur, when I look into
the heart of things,-when I, lifting up the thick cur-
tains that hang over the face of nature and peer into
the dim vistas wrapped in mystery and mysticism,
enclosed fold over fold, and a circle within a circle,
I start back at once, struck by awe and amazement,
and question to myself, what is this life after all?
Where is this world-this world of ceaseless turmoil
and endless self-seeking, this world of commercial
crisis and constant warfare, this world of astounding
inventions and increasing appetite for arts and beauty,
these slaughter houses, and deluges of lethe, this
world with these millions of human beings possessed
with religions frenzy and national aggrandizements,
with unquenched thirst for land and gold, and bias
for colour and creed-where is this world drifting to?
Nature is symbolic. Her language is symbolic.
Her ideas reach us through some symbol or other.
Nature is selflessness itself. Man is egotistic. Nature
94
commands us in silence. Man seems only a speck of
dust in her presence, creating much noise and fuss
about nothing. Nature is one immutable and univer-
sal law. Man is a fitful and blood-thirsty being in
her realms, committing havoc and creating horror.
Nations are attempting to devour nations. Amongst
the individual members of Society, each wants to
secure more advantage, more power, more wealth and
more pleasure than another. " Whom shall I plunder?
What shall be the next plan of my work to secure
that ?", are the common thoughts of mankind, rather
than, " Whom shall I serve ? What shall I do to be
useful to man or beast." In spite* of our much prais-
ed civilization, and the advancement of nations and
societies, this is the world in which we live and move
and have our being. There must therefore be some
man or God, to unravel the mysteries of nature, to
explain her symbolism and purpose, in language clear
and unequivocal. There must be a well-trained in-
terpreter between nature and mankind, to convey
boldly and fearlessly the dictates of nature, and to
guide thfe unwary humanity on to the heights of
universal wisdom and divine glory. Who is that man
who performs this task for the little village in which
he is, for the little kingdom of a province or for the
whole empire of human beings ? Who is he ? Where
is that voice which reconciles thought with action and
action with the law of nature?
Behold he comes in robes of purity and .radiance
all by himself, a simple and humble individual!
He is the reader of our thoughts; the writer and
spokesman of humanity-the herald of the coming age*
95
The seer and priest of nature, to wit-the Poet. In
this lies the function of the poet. He feels the pulse
of nature and the moods and methods of nature.
Heat is felt by what is called, heat- vibrations, so also,
the poet feels the heart of nature, by what may be
called, soul- vibrations. His soul projects into nature
in search of truth, beauty and law, as human nature
is after some kind of satisfaction, pleasure or happi-
ness. Just as our human eye sees things by a strange
phenomenon of receiving impressions, by images being
thrown on the retina in the eye, so also the poet's
mind receives the impressions from nature and reflects
them back into the world, in language melodious and
mystic, as the silent and mysterious expressions of
nature. The poet throws his mind and heart open
to the surging influence of nature and becoming
passive as it were, allows its waves of melody and
power to roll into his being. There springs up a
fountain of melody and thought that flows into the
world as poetry or a new light is lit in the poet, as
the meeting of the negative and positive poles emit
a spark. The poet sees the world with unabated zeal
and ever growing love and wonder:
The sweet chirpings of the feathered minstrels
of the woods; the whispering breeze shaking the sparkl-
ing dews on the petals of roses in the morning; the
floating castles of angels in the skies now blushing
in variegetted hues courted by the setting sun add
now jealous of the amorous moon, spending their fury
in* lightning and thunder; the tall trees shooting up
straight into the skies in search of air and sun-light;
the buds blossoming in tints of inexpressible beauty;
9 6
the -green valleys smiling under the kisses of silver
streams flowing from the high ridges of mountains;
animals moving; birds flying and nature dreaming;
and deep within this eye- enthralling panoramic view
of nature, its heart-engrossing beauties and soul-absorb*
ing melodies, the poet's seeing ^eye pierces into the
very heart of nature, into its meditative solitude and
awe-inspiring silence, into the light with which the
planetary systems shine, nay, into the fountain of life
which fills and inundates the whole universe with its
energising, vivifying and multiplying power. The poet's
feelings are subdued by nature; he is overpowered
and over-mastered by a higher and supreme power;
his chords of thought are stretched tight and tuned high
and nature plays upon them her melodies. The poet
sings the song of life; the song of love and the song
of beauty.
This is true poetry-true interpretation of nature.
There are so many persons who seem to think that
it is all imagination and mere imagination and noth-
ing els& Imagination is not an ordinary faculty. It
is the primal cause of many inventions in science.
Why, even in your geometry, a science which is high-
ly accurate and deals with facts and figures, you are
expected to be highly imaginative in concieving a
line to have length without breadth and a point to
have no magnitude at all.
Every one possesses the faculty of imagination
and every one to a certain degree is a poet. But
the real poet, one that stands on the pinnacle of true
exaltation and genuine inspiration, is a rare persofl*
97
It is of such a personality we are concerned with
to-day. The true poet is the index of the age. He
stands on the summits of knowledge announcing to
the world around of the new impulses he has receiv-
ed from the fountain of knowledge and wisdom.
In the endless turmoil and competition of this
world-the tyranny of the strong over the weak; the
mean advantage taken by the wealthy over the suf-
fering poor; the greed of gaining name and fame
through the labour of others; wolves in sheep's cloth-
ing; self-seeking men calling themselves patriots; in
these and like instances, the poet stands on the firm
basis of truth and sincerety and exposes, hypocricy,
deception and impostors, by his creative faculty in
dramatic writings and converts the mind of man, to
live for others and to do justice to nature-"a mother
kind alike to all/'
Who does not acknowledge in the history of the
world the influence of Homer, Aeschylus and Sophocles
on Greece, Dante and Virgil on Italy, Shakespeare
and Milton on England, Burns on Scotland and
Goethe on Modern Germany?
A nation's wealth of knowledge and advancement
and civilization may be easily measured by the utter-
ances of that nation's poets. I am not to-day con-
cerned with the so-colled secondary men who have a
fine ear for music and compose verses. They are
mpre versifiers and nothing more. But the true poet
is quite a different being. He looks into the raison d'etre
of things and paints the rnile-stones of Culture to mark
the progress of nations, He is the true teacher of the
98
people, as a people. For example, look at the most
wonderful influence of the great Indian Epics, the Maha-
bharata and the Ramayana. How the ideas put forth
in those books have sunk deep into the minds of both
the learned as well as the uneducated ! Life is not a
mere bubble that appears and bursts on the surface
of time. It has a deeper purpose and a deeper mean-
ing. Cradled in the beauties of nature and fed with
her secret thoughts, the poet lives in his own haven
of exaltation. He heralds the coming age. To him
the scientist, the architect and the labourer are im-
portant units in the rank and file of society. A ques-
tion is often put: ''What is the use of this race of
dreamers, who sit perhaps almost idle without pursuing
any of the professions of life to earn their living or
justify their manhood? And if a choice is given,
whether we cannot prefer the steam-engine and the
telegraph to Homer's epics and Dante's Divine corn-
media or even coming home to our own motherland,
whether we cannot dispense with our great epics-the
Mahabharata and the Ramayana and the works of
various either poets, like the great Kalidasa and the
illustrious galaxy of thinkers and writers of the era of
Vikramaditya, King Bhoja and Krishna Deva Roya,
the last great representative of Indian Imperial
Sovereignty.
The Great Poets of India sung about the ideals
of life; the transitoriness of worldly pomp and its
emptiness, the equality of man and the history *of
the slow and gradual evolution of the soul. They gave
extremely very great pleasure to mankind by the wide
99
command they had over the language, and the exquisite
rythm and melody they employed in their writings.
All the various branches of Science have their
great and mighty representatives who have added to
the knowledge of man and to the sum-total of human
happiness. Geology, botany, physics, chemistry have
yielded their golden harvest to the genius of man.
How much of patience, what perseverance, what devo-
tion to the principles of truth, do we not see when
we read the literature connected with the scientists
and their noble work 1 What noble sacrifice thy have
made and what innumerable sufferings they have under-
gone ! They are really the benefactors of humanity.
Heroes who converted their ideas and will to noble
deeds which live in the shapeof the machinery they have
invented and arts and industries that have increased
the capacity to enjoy life. Heroes indeed they are !
In the classical literature of Europe, the ancients re-
presented nature by Proteus a shepherd. This is very
suggestive of the function of the language-maker, the
heart-builder, and the soul-consoler the true Poet !
The true poet combines in himself the exquisite gift
of painting, the heroism and manliness of sculpture,
and the tenderness of music. His Science deals with
the heart of nature and man, the Omnipotent and
Omnicient Power; the Cause of causes and the root
of things. He relieves us from the hum-drum routine
of life. He feeds the world with hope, faith and love.
His machinery sets the thought- world in motion. He
is concerned with the power of the human heart, the
hitman will and human language. He is very wrongly
accused by many of being a mere dreamer not
being an active agent in the shaping of the world.
100
Thought in its finest form is melody in tune with 'the
music of the Infinite Power; in its next and lower
stage when its thermal vibrations cool down, it ex-
presses itself in action. So in the natural order of
things, the Thinker comes first and the man who
executes the will, comes next.
In speaking of Alexander 6r Caesar, the Poet-
Master teaches man the secret of universal power.
He dwells upon the highness or meaness of human
nature in such a way as to formulate opinions and
thoughts. His mission is always to lead us. He
stands by us in our hours of gloom and despair and
instils faith in us, to take life easy and yet to per-
severe onward and onward till the goal is reached.
His is a health giving optimism, exhorting us to act
in the living present. When the burden of life is laid
down, when at the approach of the cold touch of death,
the pomp and glory of wealth, lands and machinery,
vanish like mist before sunrise, and we have to leave
behind us the best and dearest of our hearts, then
the words and ideas of the Soul-Consoler, come to
our rescue and in our passage into the new worlds
and new associations, we carry the essence of our ex-
perience along with us, guided, cheered and enlivened
by the Idealism of the Poet.
THE WTCH WORD OF HOPE
TO YOUNG INDIA*
FROM
HIS IMPERIAL MAJESTY THE KING EMPEROR GEORGE V.
" To-day in India, I give to India the watch-
word of hope. On every side I see the signs and
stirrings of new life. Education has given you hope
and through better and higher education you will
build up higher and better hopes."
' c It is my wish that there may be spread over
the land a network of schools and colleges, from which
will go forth loyal, manly and useful citizens, able to
hold their own in industry and agriculture and all the
vocations in life; and it is my wish, too, that the
homes of my Indian subjects may be brightened and
their labour sweetened by the spread of knowledge
with all that follows in its train, a high leveMof thought
of comfort and of health. It is through education that
my wish will be fulfilled, and the cause of education
in India will ever be very close to my heart/'
OPINIONS.
(i) THE HON'BLE RAO BAHADUR,
RAHIANBHAI MAHIPATRAM NILKANTH. B. A. LL. B.
Additional Member of the Bombay Legislative Council.
Mr. C. R. Doraswami Naidu B. A. of Bangalore
has kindly shown me some of his English verses which
he is going to publish in his collection of Cl Heart Buds."
They form very interesting reading and bespeak
Mr. Naidu's power of imagination. The sentiments which
Mr. Naidu has expressed will, I am sure, appeal to
many. His work will, I trust, have an appreciative
reception at the hands of the Indian public.
AHMEDABAD. j Ramanbhai Mahipatram
April 1914. J Nilkanth*
(2) DEWAN BAHADUR
^AMBALAL SAKARLAL DESAI, B. A. L L. B.
Retired Chief Justice of Baroda.
Mr. C. R. Doraswami Naidu, B. A. has been
good enough to show me the Foreword of his work
styled ' Heart-Buds, ' and it gives me great pleasure
to certify to his excellent command of the English
language, and to his high sentiments and breadth of
imagination, I wis)i his effort every success.
AHMEDABAD. 1
y Ambalal St Desai,
27 th April 19/4.)
L) -J I
