by all means come whenever you can, and you shall stay with me, if you
would not mind what must appear to you to be our extreme simplicity; we
have no masters and no servants here.”
The evening was hot and oppressive indoors but mild and balmy outside,
and I sauntered under a lovely, deep sky. The women, small of body,
ankles, and wrists, with well-formed features, and softly spoken as the
Japanese, whether poor or not, wore bracelets, anklets, rings in the
ears, and some a button jewel in the side of the nose. Seldom were any
in Western costume; almost always they wore saris, graceful folds draped
over their heads. Men and boys were stretched out on the walks, their
only belongings the mats on which they lay. It was revolting to see
something stir in the dust, and watch rags change into a human being
sleeping there.
The next afternoon I had my first meeting in Cowasji Jehangir Hall, the
largest in Bombay, and clamorously noisy. It was open to the street, and
trams went wobbling by, pedestrians talked loudly, and dozens and dozens
of electric fans purred round and round and round. You had to speak at
the very top of your throat in order to be heard; Indians were
accustomed to the British enunciation and the British pitch and found
American English difficult to understand. Looking down on the audience
was like gazing at a choppy sea; it was a broken mass of Gandhi white
caps, shaped rather like those worn by our soldiers overseas. They were
not removed in the house, in shops, or even at table. Everywhere in
India you saw them, showing how large was his following.
I had been told that unmarried women did not exist in India and none of
the cultured class worked for wages. However, the very day I landed I
met three girls who were still single, gave their time to help the
outcasts, and had small apartments of their own. Two of them were trying
to be independent; another received an allowance from her father who,
though disapproving, supplied her livelihood.
It had been predicted also that only Eurasians and the lower classes
would listen to me on birth control, but the question turned out to be
not, “Shall it be given?” but “What to give?” and it came from all
strata. The Mayor of Bombay invited me to address a gathering of city
officials. Mrs. Sarojini Naidu, the famous poetess, outstanding for her
loyalty to India and next to Gandhi the most beloved person in the
country, talked with me about holding a meeting in Hyderabad, where her
husband was head of the medical profession. Lady Braybourne during
luncheon at Government House told me that she and the Governor were
anxious to prevent the fifteen hundred people on their own compound from
doubling their numbers within a few years. What would I suggest?
The answer was complicated by many factors. First and foremost was the
unspeakable poverty which prevailed. A contraceptive so cheap that it
could be available to everyone had been invented in the form of a foam
powder which could be made from rice starch; enough for a year should
not cost more than ten cents. But as yet we had not tested it
sufficiently to guarantee its harmlessness and efficacy.
The poorer women of Bombay, sober-faced and dull-looking, who
particularly needed this method, lived in the grubby and deadly
_chawls_—huts of corrugated iron—no windows, no lights, no lamps, just
three walls and sometimes old pieces of rag or paper hung up in front in
a pitiful attempt at privacy.
I soon learned that when traveling through the country we had to have a
servant, or bearer, to secure railroad compartments, make up the beds,
see we had food at various stations, and keep the vendors off.
Mattresses, blankets, sheets, pillows, towels, and soap had to accompany
us on trains. From Cook’s we acquired Joseph, an extraordinary
character, dressed always in a black alpaca coat and colorful turban. We
paid him about a dollar a day, considered a very good salary. However,
since he spoke not only Hindustani, but also Bengali, Tamil, and
English, we thought him an excellent find. He waited on us, brought us
tea in the morning, went with us on calls.
Joseph’s respect for us was enormously increased when he heard we were
going to visit Gandhi. He became our devoted adviser, sleeping outside
the door at night. Because of his position it was beneath his dignity to
carry anything. Consequently we were obliged to hire a coolie for his
luggage as well as several for our own. India was undoubtedly the place
for the white man to lose his inferiority complex, should he have one;
the serving class was obsequious, and the educated, aloof and superior.
We were met at the station at Wardha by a covered, two-wheeled cart, a
tonga, very clean with little steps leading up and drawn by a
cream-colored bullock. Since there were no seats, we sat flat on the
bottom and were pulled leisurely and slowly along dusty roads to the
_ashram_.
Gandhi was cross-legged on the floor of a room in a large squarish
structure, a white cloth like a sheet around him. He rose to greet me as
I entered with an armful of books and flowers and magazines and gloves
that I had not realized were there until we tried to take each other by
both hands. He beamed and I laughed.
Perhaps even more exaggerated than his pictures was Gandhi’s appearance:
his ears stuck out more prominently; his shaved head was more shaved;
his toothless mouth grinned more broadly, leaving a great void between
his lips. But around him and a part of him was a luminous aura. And once
you had seen this, the ugliness faded and you glimpsed the something in
the essence of his being which people have followed and which has made
them call him the Mahatma.
This was Monday, Gandhi’s day of silence, of meditation and prayer. He
was so besieged by problems and difficulties on which he had to decide
that this one twenty-four hours he reserved for himself without
interruption. Therefore, he merely smiled and nodded his head and then
Anna Jane and I were escorted along a gravel path to the guest house,
perhaps a hundred yards away, a building of four rooms, rough-hewn,
white-plastered walls, the upper section open for ventilation. On the
uneven stone floor stood two mattress-less cots on which our bedding was
spread. A roof pole in the center had a circular shelf which served as
table or chairs according to need.
Bowls of porridge and milk were brought, sweetened with either honey or
burned sugar—I could not tell which, but it was very pleasant. I asked
no questions about its being boiled, or whether it was goats’ or cows’
milk; although I happened not to be hungry, down it went just the same.
From tiffin on we inspected the cotton-growing, the paper-making, the
oil press, and the irrigation by means of old-fashioned turn wheels. I
was not enthusiastic. It seemed so pitiable an effort, like going
backward instead of forward, and trying to keep millions laboring on
petty hand processes merely in order to give them work to do by which
they might exist.
In the evening Gandhi wrote on his slate that next morning I could join
him in his walk. This was his regular exercise, occupying about an hour.
He took quite good care of himself physically, observing rules of health
and diet rigidly and strictly. He had to in order to perform the
tremendous quantity of labor always facing him.
After we had ascended to the roof for evening prayers, our cots were
moved out on the terrace under the moon and stars and the glorious,
limitless sky overhead. Lights shimmered along the path to the main
house but, for the rest, all was darkness. I never was more conscious of
nature’s stillness or of more constant stirrings from human beings—the
echoing chant from the village near by, singing, calling, laughing, dogs
barking, the sounds wafted clearly through the cool and crisp air while
not a leaf on the trees trembled. At four the bells rang out for morning
prayers and at six Joseph came to tell me the hour and I arose and
dressed.
Gandhi and I walked with his other two women guests; they deemed sacred
every moment they spent with him. Men, women, and children waited for
him as he passed, several prostrating themselves as to a holy person.
Stepping over the debris we traversed narrow byways through the open
fields where families huddled in their tiny huts together with dogs and
goats. People were bathing and washing and cleaning their teeth. Little
spirals of smoke were drifting from the fires for the morning meal.
At eleven we all went to our breakfast across the court, leaving our
shoes outside. Everybody was ready, and great shining trays of
silver-looking metal were placed before us on the floor. Gandhi was
trying to persuade the Indians to utilize native-grown vegetables in
different ways and thus increase their vitamin consumption. Mrs. Gandhi
supervised the culinary department, and herself served the meal, of
which there was a goodly and varied supply—no meat, but plenty of fruits
and vegetables in curious combinations, such as tomatoes and oranges in
a salad. All picked up their food with their fingers, mixing it and
scooping it in very cleverly without dropping a morsel.
So numerous were Gandhi’s adherents, so deep his influence, that I was
sure his endorsement of birth control would be of tremendous value if I
could convince him how necessary it was for Indian women. After
breakfast I set myself to the task.
He spoke fluent English in a low voice with accurate intonations, never
lacking for a word, and could apparently discuss any subject near or
far. Nevertheless, I felt his registering of impressions was blunted;
while you were answering a question of his, he held to an idea or a
train of thought of his own, and, as soon as you stopped, continued it
as though he had not heard you. Time and again I believed he was going
along with me, and then came the stone wall of religion or emotion or
experience, and I could not dynamite him over this obstacle. In fact,
despite his claim to open-mindedness, he was proud of not altering his
opinions.
Gandhi maintained that he knew women and was in sympathetic accord with
them. Personally, after listening to him for a while, I did not believe
he had the faintest glimmering of the inner workings of a woman’s heart
or mind. He accused himself of being a brute by having desired his wife
when he was younger, and classed all sex relations as debasing acts,
although sometimes necessary for procreation. He agreed that no more
than three or four children should be born to a family, but insisted
that intercourse, therefore, should be restricted for the entire married
life of the couple to three or four occasions.
I suggested that such a regimen was bound to cause psychological
disturbances in both husband and wife. Furthermore, when respect and
consideration and reverence were a part of the relationship I called it
love, not lust, even if it found expression in sex union, with or
without children.
Gandhi referred me to nature, the great director, who would solve our
problems if we depended on her, but said what we were doing was to
inject man’s ideas into nature.
To this I replied, “How can you differentiate? Here is cotton growing on
your land and lemons also. That’s nature. Would you object to dipping
cotton into lemon juice and using that as a contraceptive?”
He said positively that he would. For every argument I presented he
countered with “I would devise other methods,” but proposed none that
was not based on continence. He reiterated that women in order to
control the size of their families must “resist” their husbands, in
extreme cases leave them.
Those who listened to the interview declared that the Mahatma made
concessions he had never made before. He himself said to me, “This has
not been wasted effort. We have certainly come nearer together.”
Nevertheless, I knew it was futile to count on Gandhi to help the
movement in India; his state of mind would not change. After reading his
autobiography, I thought I saw the cause of his inhibitions. He himself
had had the feeling which he termed lust, and he now hated it. It formed
an emotional pivot in his brain around which centered everything having
to do with sex. But there remained his kindness, his hospitality, his
arrangements for your comfort, which he duplicated again and again for
visitors who gave nothing, but instead received inspiration from him.
And, furthermore, since humanity as a rule does little for itself and
the inert mass has to be upheaved to a point where it can gain
initiative, anyone who can arouse a nation of all classes and ages out
of the incredible lethargy into which it has long been sunk and can stir
up a people to hope is a great, even noble, person.
Nevertheless, in contrast to Gandhi’s attitude towards birth control,
Rabindranath Tagore’s was a comfort. With Anna Jane and Joseph I set out
on the long trip to Calcutta—two-thirds of the breadth of India. Now you
really saw the country—the palms and banana trees, the natives getting
on trains, living in their tiny huts. These were of bamboo plastered
with mud and whitewashed; the floors were soaked with cow dung to harden
the dirt, and the roofs were thatched with straw. As we passed through
village after village, I observed cows, goats, dogs, bullocks, all with
their young, rambling in the streets, freely mixing with the people and
scrambling out of the way when a whistle or bell sounded. Peddlers,
balancing on their heads trays heaped with oranges, walked up and down
the station platforms, calling their wares in a fascinating, sing-song
meter.
We arrived at Bolpur beyond Calcutta at seven-thirty of an early
December evening. Tagore’s son had been on the train and we went with
him to Santineketan, House of Peace, where Tagore lived and taught. The
grouping of buildings in the thousand-acre estate resembled that of an
ancient monastery, not so cozy or individual as Gandhi’s, but rather
cold and bare. Before sunrise again I heard the chanting prayers of the
students. Boys and girls together then went at six o’clock to study in
the mango grove or under the banyan trees, all in the open air.
His former luxurious home Tagore had turned over to his son, and himself
occupied a small clay house designed like a temple in modern style. The
room into which I was shown in the afternoon was full of books and
papers, like the office of a busy executive. Tagore, in a long, rough,
handmade robe of homespun, was seated behind his desk. I had been told I
would find him greatly aged, but, although he was slightly thinner than
when I had seen him in New York in 1931, he did not seem much older.
True his beard and hair were scantier, but his face, almost unlined, had
the same repose, and his finely modulated voice expressed the same
understanding when he spoke of the importance of birth control to his
country, and sincerely hoped I would be able to reach the villagers,
which he said must be done were it to bring any benefit to India.
Tagore knew I had been to see Gandhi, but did not mention it. He had
tact combined with his grace and intellect; he drew, painted, directed
dancing, even sculptured and acted. Appealing to more moneyed classes
than Gandhi, he guided his school towards furthering culture and the
arts as well as improving agricultural necessities.
The medical building in Calcutta had been selected for my first lecture
there, but Mr. O’Connor, who was in charge, refused permission. Since
the edifice belonged to the British Government, birth control became at
once popular with the Indians, and the meeting was transferred to Albert
Hall. I was warned we needed as chairman a good strong man with a
domineering personality, because it was a rowdy place and trouble-makers
always haunted it. However, the association which had asked me to speak
had already chosen a woman, Mrs. Soudamini Mehta, who was managing the
clinic in Calcutta. I talked against the noise for forty minutes and
then Mrs. Mehta, whose voice scarcely carried over the footlights,
opened the forum for questions.
Two bearded patriarchs looking like Messiahs were sitting in the front
row. One of them hopped up and, without asking a question, began
haranguing in unctuous tones. Mrs. Mehta tried to stop him, but could
not. The audience tried to yell him down; a few were with him but most
were not. Then a fist fight broke out and the second sexagenarian rose
and demanded recognition. Someone caught his hands from behind, and
another row began.
Finally I said to Mrs. Mehta, “Perhaps they can hear me. Let’s ask them
whether they want to listen to these men.”
At once a mighty roar of “No!” went up. Then both the old men erupted
again, shrieking. Mrs. Mehta, anger lending strength to her vocal
chords, at last called out indignantly, “You’re naughty, and the meeting
is now dismissed!” And so, amid shouts of merriment, we broke up.
I had no more lectures scheduled for a time, and accepted with pleasure
the invitation of Mrs. Norman Odling to visit her at Kalimpong, in the
shadow of Mt. Everest, three hundred and fifty miles north of Calcutta.
In preparing for this excursion I had to decide whether to take Joseph.
He was a silent man. Whenever I had requested him to perform any
service, from getting the laundry together to looking after the luggage,
he had never answered yes or no but had only shaken his head—not a
regular shake, but a nodding from side to side as though he were saying,
“Well, well, well!” I had usually sighed, “Never mind.” I had grown
rather exasperated with what seemed his deplorable lack of enthusiasm,
although Anna Jane appeared to like him; being busy in other directions,
especially with beaux, she had left many things for him to attend to.
Finally I informed Cook’s that we were departing for the North and would
like somebody else. When their representative came around to
investigate, he said to Joseph, “Do you wish to go with Mrs. Sanger?”
Joseph shook his head.
“There you are!” I exclaimed. “He doesn’t want to go.”
At that Joseph put up pleading hands and spoke in Hindustani.
“Yes, he does,” said the Cook’s man. “When he shakes his head ‘no’ he
means ‘yes.’”
Before we started Joseph mentioned to me how wintry it was in the
Himalayas; he must have an overcoat. I asked whether he had ever been
there.
“Yes.”
“Did you have a coat then?”
“Yes.”
“Did someone buy it for you?”
“Yes, always buy it for bearers.”
“Well, where’s that coat?”
“Worn out.”
I questioned Cook’s about that also and was told, “He’s trying to do
you. Probably he already has two or three, and if you give him another
he’ll just sell it.”
We hardened our hearts, and Joseph had to get along without his coat.
As we progressed north the nights grew cold, the mornings cold, four in
the afternoon was cold. Joseph had changed to a hideous black hat which
he said was warmer than his turban, but he had no overcoat and began to
cough.
We arrived at Siliguri at six of a brisk morning, just in time to watch
the rose-colored dawn break over the snow-covered mountains. After a cup
of hot but vile coffee we wrapped ourselves in rugs and off we went on
the full hour’s drive to Kalimpong, up and around hairpin curves, mostly
following the river, often through bits of jungle whence you knew a
tiger might spring out on the road any minute. The scenery was the most
superb I had ever seen, grander than the Rockies or Pyrenees or Alps, a
blend of green tangle and white peaks touching the clear sky, with
wreaths of clouds far below.
As we neared Kalimpong there was a distinct difference in the type of
native; Thibetans and Nepalese were frequent. The swarms of women looked
like squaws, although, instead of papooses, they carried on their backs
huge baskets of charcoal or from six to eight massive blocks of stone,
all for six cents a day. No horses, no mules, no wagons, only women as
beasts of burden hauling these rocks from the quarry to the site,
jingling with rings on their ankles and rings on their toes. What struck
me as most peculiar was that many of them wore ugly shawls, assuredly
products of Scottish mills; the entire hillside was dotted with plaids.
As soon as I reached Mrs. Odling’s home and heard the accent of her
medical missionary father, I knew the answer. “We never think of going
home to Scotland without bringing some back,” she said. “They much
prefer plaids to their own designs.”
Mrs. Odling was a darling, born there in the hills, and was intensely
interested in cultivating the industries of the Thibetans, whom she
encouraged to come across the border with their handsome silver boxes
and brass bowls studded with turquoise. They were not a
pleasant-appearing people. It was almost ludicrous to see this delicate
woman slapping some of the worst-looking characters heartily on the
shoulder and talking to them in their primitive language; it was evident
they adored her and would do anything for her.
Kalimpong itself was lovely and sunny, perched on an outer spur of the
eastern Himalayas; in the background soared up the mighty, snowy barrier
of Kinchenjunga, which screened it from Thibet, and past it ran the
high, chill, rocky road to Lhasa.
To reach Darjeeling, which was on the far side of a mountain range, it
was necessary to retrace our steps to Siliguri and then go along a
magnificent but treacherous road up another valley. Darjeeling itself
disappointed me, a hodgepodge of everybody and everything—tourists,
riffraff, exorbitant prices on worthless articles, scarcely a few good
ones in gift shops. But I had the opportunity of buying for Grant the
skin of a tiger shot in a recent hunt, and this beauty was packed in
moth balls and sent directly to the ship. Also a case of Darjeeling tea
from one of the choicest gardens was delivered to me in Calcutta,
whither I now returned.
There a certain Dr. Ankelsaria, an Indian lecturer who had spoken in
America on psychology and psychic phenomena, established himself as my
interpreter and guide and dragged me willy-nilly to see such sights as
the Jain Temple and Crystal Palace. He overheard me telephoning for an
appointment with Sir Jagardis Chandra Bose, famous for his ingenious
theory that plants breathed. He promptly said, “I know Sir Jagardis very
well; I’ll take you there.”
I intimated that Anna Jane and I were the only ones invited, but he
said, “Oh, that’s nothing. We all go there to tea quite often.” But when
he did not arrive at the designated hour we set off in a taxi, somewhat
relieved.
Sir Jagardis was a person of great dignity—elderly, polished, the
scientist pure and simple. He seemed to me like a person trying to keep
his life clear, without having externals crowd in upon him too closely.
We had hardly finished our tea when to my surprise Dr. Ankelsaria
appeared in the doorway and Sir Jagardis inquired, “Do you wish to have
this gentleman?” We explained he had offered to bring us in his car.
Soon we walked out to see the garden, where plants of every description
were carefully tended, each treated like an only child—this one put to
bed early, that one awakened by the sun, this shrank from noise, that
loved running water, this craved a moist atmosphere, that needed a
desert in which to thrive; he understood the characteristics of each. He
himself was disturbed because his flowers did not like the presence of
Dr. Ankelsaria and would be affected by it.
From there we stepped into the laboratory, where Sir Jagardis
demonstrated the working of his machine. When he placed either nitrogen
or carbon on the plant the instrument, which had been almost quiescent,
made tiny marks, much as a person’s heartbeat was shown on a
cardiograph.
Dr. Ankelsaria pushed in and got out a pencil and notebook. Sir Jagardis
at once froze, ceased talking, and asked, “Are you a newspaper
reporter?”
“No, I’m a doctor.”
“What are you taking down? I’ll not have it!” Then, turning to me as
though I had been guilty of treachery, “My conversation with you was
personal and confidential.”
I was profoundly embarrassed and, as severely as I knew how, requested
Dr. Ankelsaria to stop his writing immediately.