The Home and the World by Rabindranath Tagore (children's ebooks online .txt) 📖

>which is being cooked will be crammed. They will partition

Bengal and say it is for your benefit. They will seal the doors

of education and call it raising the standard. But you will

always remain good boys, snivelling in your corners. We bad men,

however, must see whether we cannot erect a defensive

fortification of untruth."

"It is no use arguing about these things, Nikhil," my master

interposed. "How can they who do not feel the truth within them,

realize that to bring it out from its obscurity into the light is

man's highest aim--not to keep on heaping material outside?"

Sandip laughed. "Right, sir!" said he. "Quite a correct speech

for a schoolmaster. That is the kind of stuff I have read in

books; but in the real world I have seen that man's chief

business is the accumulation of outside material. Those who are

masters in the art, advertise the biggest lies in their business,

enter false accounts in their political ledgers with their

broadest-pointed pens, launch their newspapers daily laden with

untruths, and send preachers abroad to disseminate falsehood like

flies carrying pestilential germs. I am a humble follower of

these great ones. When I was attached to the Congress party I

never hesitated to dilute ten per cent of truth with ninety per

cent of untruth. And now, merely because I have ceased to belong

to that party, I have not forgotten the basic fact that man's

goal is not truth but success."

"True success," corrected my master.

"Maybe," replied Sandip, "but the fruit of true success ripens

only by cultivating the field of untruth, after tearing up the

soil and pounding it into dust. Truth grows up by itself like

weeds and thorns, and only worms can expect to get fruit from

it!" With this he flung out of the room.

My master smiled as he looked towards me. "Do you know, Nikhil,"

he said, "I believe Sandip is not irreligious--his religion is of

the obverse side of truth, like the dark moon, which is still a

moon, for all that its light has gone over to the wrong side."

"That is why," I assented, "I have always had an affection for

him, though we have never been able to agree. I cannot contemn

him, even now; though he has hurt me sorely, and may yet hurt me

more."

"I have begun to realize that," said my master. "I have long

wondered how you could go on putting up with him. I have, at

times, even suspected you of weakness. I now see that though you

two do not rhyme, your rhythm is the same."

"Fate seems bent on writing Paradise Lost in blank verse,

in my case, and so has no use for a rhyming friend!" I remarked,

pursuing his conceit.

"But what of Panchu?" resumed my master.

"You say Harish Kundu wants to eject him from his ancestral

holding. Supposing I buy it up and then keep him on as my

tenant?"

"And his fine?"

"How can the zamindar realize that if he becomes my

tenant?"

"His burnt bale of cloth?"

"I will procure him another. I should like to see anyone

interfering with a tenant of mine, for trading as he pleases!"

"I am afraid, sir," interposed Panchu despondently, "while you

big folk are doing the fighting, the police and the law vultures

will merrily gather round, and the crowd will enjoy the fun, but

when it comes to getting killed, it will be the turn of only poor

me!"

"Why, what harm can come to you?"

"They will burn down my house, sir, children and all!"

"Very well, I will take charge of your children," said my master.

"You may go on with any trade you like. They shan't touch you."

That very day I bought up Panchu's holding and entered into

formal possession. Then the trouble began.

Panchu had inherited the holding of his grandfather as his sole

surviving heir. Everybody knew this. But at this juncture an

aunt turned up from somewhere, with her boxes and bundles, her

rosary, and a widowed niece. She ensconced herself in Panchu's

home and laid claim to a life interest in all he had.

Panchu was dumbfounded. "My aunt died long ago," he protested.

In reply he was told that he was thinking of his uncle's first

wife, but that the former had lost no time in taking to himself a

second.

"But my uncle died before my aunt," exclaimed Panchu, still more

mystified. "Where was the time for him to marry again?"

This was not denied. But Panchu was reminded that it had never

been asserted that the second wife had come after the death of

the first, but the former had been married by his uncle during

the latter's lifetime. Not relishing the idea of living with a

co-wife she had remained in her father's house till her husband's

death, after which she had got religion and retired to holy

Brindaban, whence she was now coming. These facts were well

known to the officers of Harish Kundu, as well as to some of his

tenants. And if the zamindar's summons should be

peremptory enough, even some of those who had partaken of the

marriage feast would be forthcoming!

IX

One afternoon, when I happened to be specially busy, word came to

my office room that Bimala had sent for me. I was startled.

"Who did you say had sent for me?" I asked the messenger.

"The Rani Mother."

"The Bara Rani?"

"No, sir, the Chota Rani Mother."

The Chota Rani! It seemed a century since I had been sent for by

her. I kept them all waiting there, and went off into the inner

apartments. When I stepped into our room I had another shock of

surprise to find Bimala there with a distinct suggestion of being

dressed up. The room, which from persistent neglect had latterly

acquired an air of having grown absent-minded, had regained

something of its old order this afternoon. I stood there

silently, looking enquiringly at Bimala.

She flushed a little and the fingers of her right hand toyed for

a time with the bangles on her left arm. Then she abruptly broke

the silence. "Look here! Is it right that ours should be the

only market in all Bengal which allows foreign goods?"

"What, then, would be the right thing to do?" I asked.

"Order them to be cleared out!"

"But the goods are not mine."

"Is not the market yours?"

"It is much more theirs who use it for trade."

"Let them trade in Indian goods, then."

"Nothing would please me better. But suppose they do not?"

"Nonsense! How dare they be so insolent? Are you not ..."

"I am very busy this afternoon and cannot stop to argue it out.

But I must refuse to tyrannize."

"It would not be tyranny for selfish gain, but for the sake of

the country."

"To tyrannize for the country is to tyrannize over the country.

But that I am afraid you will never understand." With this I

came away.

All of a sudden the world shone out for me with a fresh

clearness. I seemed to feel it in my blood, that the Earth had

lost the weight of its earthiness, and its daily task of

sustaining life no longer appeared a burden, as with a wonderful

access of power it whirled through space telling its beads of

days and nights. What endless work, and withal what illimitable

energy of freedom! None shall check it, oh, none can ever check

it! From the depths of my being an uprush of joy, like a

waterspout, sprang high to storm the skies.

I repeatedly asked myself the meaning of this outburst of

feeling. At first there was no intelligible answer. Then it

became clear that the bond against which I had been fretting

inwardly, night and day, had broken. To my surprise I discovered

that my mind was freed from all mistiness. I could see

everything relating to Bimala as if vividly pictured on a camera

screen. It was palpable that she had specially dressed herself

up to coax that order out of me. Till that moment, I had never

viewed Bimala's adornment as a thing apart from herself. But

today the elaborate manner in which she had done up her hair, in

the English fashion, made it appear a mere decoration. That

which before had the mystery of her personality about it, and was

priceless to me, was now out to sell itself cheap.

As I came away from that broken cage of a bedroom, out into the

golden sunlight of the open, there was the avenue of bauhinias,

along the gravelled path in front of my verandah, suffusing the

sky with a rosy flush. A group of starlings beneath the trees

were noisily chattering away. In the distance an empty bullock

cart, with its nose on the ground, held up its tail aloft--one of

its unharnessed bullocks grazing, the other resting on the grass,

its eyes dropping for very comfort, while a crow on its back was

pecking away at the insects on its body.

I seemed to have come closer to the heartbeats of the great earth

in all the simplicity of its daily life; its warm breath fell on

me with the perfume of the bauhinia blossoms; and an anthem,

inexpressibly sweet, seemed to peal forth from this world, where

I, in my freedom, live in the freedom of all else.

We, men, are knights whose quest is that freedom to which our

ideals call us. She who makes for us the banner under which we

fare forth is the true Woman for us. We must tear away the

disguise of her who weaves our net of enchantment at home, and

know her for what she is. We must beware of clothing her in the

witchery of our own longings and imaginings, and thus allow her

to distract us from our true quest.

Today I feel that I shall win through. I have come to the

gateway of the simple; I am now content to see things as they

are. I have gained freedom myself; I shall allow freedom to

others. In my work will be my salvation.

I know that, time and again, my heart will ache, but now that I

understand its pain in all its truth, I can disregard it. Now

that I know it concerns only me, what after all can be its value?

The suffering which belongs to all mankind shall be my crown.

Save me, Truth! Never again let me hanker after the false

paradise of Illusion. If I must walk alone, let me at least

tread your path. Let the drum-beats of Truth lead me to Victory.

Sandip's Story

VII

Bimala sent for me that day, but for a time she could not utter a

word; her eyes kept brimming up to the verge of overflowing. I

could see at once that she had been unsuccessful with Nikhil.

She had been so proudly confident that she would have her own

way--but I had never shared her confidence. Woman knows man well

enough where he is weak, but she is quite unable to fathom him

where he is strong. The fact is that man is as much a mystery to

woman as woman is to man. If that were not so, the separation of

the sexes would only have been a waste of Nature's energy.

Ah pride,