I recollect still another case where H. P. B. had the
dispensing of " fairy-gold " to use the popular term.
Fortunately the beneficiary has left us the story in
printer's ink.
It seems that at a meeting of certain well-known Spiritualists of Boston (Mass.) something was said as to the probability of the Spiritual Scientist dying out for lack of patronage. The late C. H. Foster, a famous medium who was present, gave as from a controlling spirit, the positive declaration that the calamity in question was impending ; as, in fact, it was, since its Editor, Mr. Gerry Brown, had a rather large note to pay very soon and no means to meet it with. These introductory facts were published in the Spiritual Scientist, together with the following sequel, quoted from a clipping from that journal which I find in one of our scrap-books :
" A few days ago the manager of the 6'«V«/«'.f/ received a notice to call at the Western Union Telegraph Office and receipt for money sent by telegraph. He went with the following experience :
" Scene Western Union Telegraph Ofifice. Time, noon. To the left, receiver at desk. Enter on the right an individual who presents a money-Order notice.
" Clerk. Are you expecting money ?
" Individual. Well, that 's my name and address on
the order, and that 's your notice to me. I have no one
in mind however.
" Clerk. Do you know of one Sir Henry de Morgan ?
^''Individual. (Smiling broadly.) Well, I have heard
it said that the spirit of the gentleman you mention,
who lived on earth 250 years ago, takes a kind interest
in my welfare. I '11 receipt for the money.
" Clerk. (Drawing back and changing tone.) Do
you know any one about here who can identify you
"Individual. Yes.
" Here a member of the company is called who knows
Individual and the money is paid.
" An hour later a telegram came saying :
" ' I contribute dollars to pay note, due
June 19th, and defy Charles Foster to make his prophecy
good. The challenge to be published. Go to Western
Union Telegraph Office, get money, and acknowledge
receipt by telegraph.
" ' Sir Henry de Morgan.'
"The money was sent from a far distant city. As the
telegram asks us to publish, we do so willingly. We
advance no opinion in this case. We have already
shown the telegram to several prominent spiritualists,
one of whom suggests that a member of the circle is
guying us. Well and good. We are willing to be guyed
as often as any one wishes to guy us in this manner."
Of course, the " distant city " was Philadelphia, and the sender, H. P. B., who as above mentioned was, with myself, interested in helping the Editor to pull his paper through a pecuniary crisis. Now, I am fully acquainted with the extent of H. P. B.'s own resources at that time, and I absolutely know that she was not in a position to send sums, either large or small, to impecunious third parties, and that her second husband was as poor as herself and without credit to borrow upon. She must have got the money as she got that for her purchases in New York and for travelling expenses in India, viz., from the Lodge. The Sir Henry Morgan of the telegram was John King, the alleged spirit control, in whose name H. P. B.'s first phenomena were done in New York and Philadelphia.
By an interesting coincidence, while correcting these
proofs, I found in our Library a book about Morgan, of
which I had lost sight for some years. Its title is The
History of the Bucaniers of America ; from their First
Original down to this Time ; written in several languages;
and now collected into one volume. Containing : The
Exploits and Adventures of Le Grand, Lolonois, Roche Brasiliano, Bat the
Portuguese, Sir Henry Morgan, etc. Written in Dutch by Jo. Esquemeling, one of
the Bucaniers, and thence translated into Spanish, etc.,
etc. [London, 1699. The Original Edition.]
It is a queer, quaint, blood-curdling old book, that I
picked up in New York, I think, and we had it early in
our acquaintance. The thing that gives it an especial
interest to us is that the intelligence which masqueraded for my edification as
John King phenomenally precipitated on the three blank leaves preceding the Title-page,
the following doggerel verses :
" To my fast friend Harry Olcott.
" Hark ye o gents to Captain Morgan's pedigree
Herein furnished by lying Esquemeling ;
The latter but a truant, and in some degree
The Spaniard's spy Dutch Jew who pennance sought and sailing
Back to his foggy land, and took to book-selling.
Ye lying cur ! Though Captain Morgan bucaniered
He natheless knew well I trow the wrong from right,
From face of ennemie the Captain never steered.
And never tacked about to show his heels in fight.
Though he loved wenches, wine, and gold he was a goodly knight.
He passed away for noble virtue praised round,
Encompast by his friends who shov'd him underground
And settled Above disguising for a change
His title, and name so famous once that may seem strange
But aint, and called himself _/»//« King the King of Sprites
Protector to weak wench defender of her rights
Peace to the bones of both the Pirat and the Knight
For both have rotten away the good and wicked spright
And both of them have met forwith when disembodied.
The Dutch biographer met with a tristful case
Sir Henry Morgan's spirit who had long uphoarded
The wrongs made by the Jew chased his foe's Sprite apace
And never Spirit world before or after witnessed
A more sound thrashing or more mirthful race."
" Moralitey
" Know O friend Harry, that a Sprite's aflfray
In Summer Land is common any day,
That all thy evil deeds on earth begotten
Can never there be easily forgotten.
" Yer benevolent friend,
" John King."
The quaint diction and spelling of these verses will
command attention, and I submit that they are much
more characteristic of such an intelligence as presumably
was the buccaneer knight's than the mass of sloppy
communications vye have got through mediums.
Besides the open book-shelves between the windows
in our work-room at the Lamasery, there was a smaller
one with glass doors, which stood in the N. E. window.
On the day when I purchased the lioness head, above
mentioned, I also bought a fine specimen of the large
American grey owl, which was very well mounted. I
first put it on a small stand in one of the corners, but
later transferred it to the top of this smaller book-case,
putting a box inside the cornice to raise the bird up to the proper height for
display. I mention the circumstance because of an instructive phenomenon that
happened between the time of my putting the box inside the
cornice, and taking the stuffed bird from the writing
table behind me to lift it to its place. In that instant of
time there came upon the flat part of the cornice and
the frames of the two glass doors, some large Tibetan writings in letters of
gold ; and of so permanent a character that they remained there until we left New York'
Observe the procedure : I face the book-case to put the empty box on top, and
this brings my face in actual contact with the exposed front of the book-case, and I see
nothing whatever written or painted on the plain wood
surfaces. I turn about in my tracks, pick up the bird, turn back to lift it to
its place, and there are the goldlettered Tibetan messages before my eyes. Was this a
positive or a negative Mayi, the precipitation at that
instant of a writing by thought-force, from the distance across the room where
H. P. B. sat ? or was it an inhibition on the sight of myself and the several others in the
room, until the right moment came for removing the
temporary and special blindness, and allowing us to see
what H. P. B. had probably written in gold-ink during
the daytime, and then had hidden under her " veil of
Maya " ? I think the latter.
Mr. Judge tells Mr. Sinnett (vide Incidents in the Life of Madame Blavatsky, p.
191) of a phenomenon of precipitation, of which I also was witness. The facts are
as follows : One evening H. P. B., Mr. Judge, and I
were together and a letter had to be written to Mr.
M. D. Evans, of Philadelphia, an insurance-broker.
Neither of us could at the moment recollect his address ; there was no place
near by where a Philadelphia Directory could be consulted ; and we were at our wit's end.
H. P. B. and I both recollected that in Philadelphia she
had had on her table a slip of blotting paper with Mr.
Evans' address printed on it, in a wave-line along with
that of an insurance company, but neither of us could
recall it. Finally, she did this : she took from the table
before us a japanned tin paper-cutter, stroked it gently,
laid a piece of blotting paper over it, passed her hand
over the surface, lifted the paper, and there, on the
black japanned surface of the paper-cutter was printed in bronze ink the
facsimile of the inscription on the Philadelphia blotting slip that Evans had given her in that
city. Her physical brain could not recollect the inscription, but when she focussed her will-power upon the
(physically speaking) vague memory of her astral brain, the hidden image was
dragged to light again and precipitated upon the determined surface. This was a case
of a " subliminal " being converted into a supraliminal
consciousness ; and a most interesting one, it will be
conceded.
I leave the reader to decide whether the following phenomenon was a Maya, an apport, a trick, or a crea tion. She and I were as usual one evening smoking while at work ; she her cigarette, I my pipe. It was a new one, I remember, and the tobacco was as good as one could wish, but she suddenly sniffed and ex claimed, " Pah ! what horrid tobacco you are smoking, Olcott ! " I said she was very much mistaken, as both pipe and tobacco were unexceptionable. " Well," she said, " I don't like it this evening ; take a cigarette." " No," I replied, " I '11 not smoke since it annoys you." " Why don't you use those nice Turkish pipes that come from Constantinople ? " said she. " Because I have none a very good reason," "Well, then, here's one for you," she exclaimed, dropping her hand down beside her arm-chair, and bringing it up again with a pipe in it, which she handed me. It had a red clay, flaring bowl, set in filagree gilt, and a stem covered with purple velvet and ornamented with a slight gilt chain with imitation coins attached. I took it with a simple " Thank you," filled and lit it, and went on with my work. " How do you like it ? " she asked. " Well enough," I said, " al though instead of purple I wish the velvet had been blue." " Oh well, have a blue one then," she remarked ; again putting down her hand and lifting it again with a blue-stemmed pipe in it. I thanked her and continued my work. The manoeuvre was again repeated, and she said, " Here 's a baby pipe," and she gave me a minia ture edition of the larger sort. Being apparently in the mood for surprises, she then successively produced a Turkish cigarette mouth-piece in gilt and amber, a Turk ish coffee-pot and sugar-bowl, and finally a gilt tray in repouss^ with imitation enamel ornamentation. " Any more ?" I asked. " Has any Turkish shop been afire ? " She laughed, and said that would do for that evening ; but some time she might take the fancy of giving me by magic an Arab horse fully caparisoned, to ride down Broadway in a procession of the Theosophical Society and astonish the natives ! Many, very many persons, saw the pipes and coffee equipage in our rooms there after, and when we left New York all were given away to friends, save the gilt tray and sugar-basin which I brought out to India and have still.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CHARACTER SKETCH OF MME. BLAVATSKY.
A FEW words more to complete the character
sketch of H. P. B. She was, even in her youth
to judge from her early portraits a plump person, and
later in life became very corpulent. It seems to have
been a family peculiarity. In her case the tendency was
aggravated by the manner of life she led, taking next to
no physical exercise whatever, and eating much unless
seriously out of health. Even then she partook largely
of fatty meats and used to pour melted butter by the
quantity over her fried eggs at breakfast. Wines and
spirits she never touched, her beverages being tea and
coffee, preferably the latter. Her appetite, while I knew
her, was extremely capricious, and she was most rebel
lious to all fixed hours for meals, hence a terror to all
cooks and the despair of her colleague.
I remember an instance at Philadelphia which shows
this peculiarity in an especial degree. She had one
maid-of-all-work, and on this particular day a leg of
mutton was boiling for dinner. Suddenly H. P. B. be
thought her to write a note to a lady friend who lived
at the other end of the city, an hour's journey each way,
as there were no trams or other public conveyances
going direct from the one house to the other. She
called in trumpet tones for the maid, and ordered her to
set off instantly with the note and bring the answer.
The poor girl told her that the dinner would be spoilt,
and she could not possibly get back until an hour be
yond the usual time. H. P. B. would not listen and told
her to begone at once. Three-quarters of an hour
later H. P. B. began complaining that the stupid idiot
of a girl had not returned ; she was hungry and wanted
her dinner, and sent all Philadelphia servants to the
devil en masse. In another quarter of an hour she had
grown desperate, and so we went down to the kitchen
for a look. Of course, the pots of meat and vegetables
were set back on the range, the fire was banked, and the
prospect of dinner was extremely small. H. P. B.'s
wrath was vehement, and so there was nothing for us
but to turn to and cook for ourselves. When the maid
returned she was scolded so roundly that she burst into
tears and gave warning ! At New York, if any nice
visitor chanced to be there, either the dinner would have
to wait indefinitely, or he or she or they for it made no
difference would be asked to come in and dine, and
the portions provided for us two had to be divided and
gub-divided for perhaps four people. At Bombay it
was worse : one day the dinner would be put off two
hours and another H. P. B. would demand to be served
an hour before the time ; and then frighten the wretched
Goanese servants into fits, because the vegetables were
half-boiled and the meat half-cooked. So when we
removed to Adyar I determined to put a stop to this
bother, and built a kitchen on the terrace near H. P. B.'s
bed-room, gave her a set of servants to herself, and let
her eat or go without as she pleased.
I found on visiting her in London after her removal
there, that the same old system was in vogue, H. P. B.'s
appetite having become more capricious than ever be
cause of the progress of disease, although every possible
delicacy was provided by her friends to tempt her.
Poor thing ! it was not her fault, although her ill health
had been largely caused by her almost life-long neglect
of the rules of digestion. She was never an ascetic, not
even a vegetarian while I knew her, flesh diet seeming
to be indispensable for her health and comfort ; as
it is to so many others in our Society, including myself,
I know many who have tried their best to get on with
vegetable diet, and some, myself for example, who have
followed up the experiment for several years together,
yet have been forced finally to revert to their old diet
against their will. Some, on the contrary, like Mrs.
Besant and other prominent Theosophists I could name,
have found themselves much healthier, stronger, and
better on non-flesh food, and gradually acquire a posi
tive loathing for meat in any of its forms. All which
verifies the old proverb, " AVhat is one man's meat is
another man's poison." I think that neither blame is
warranted in one case nor praise in the other, because
of the regimen one chooses by preference. It is not
what goes into the mouth that defiles a man, but what
lies in his heart. A wise old saying, worth remember
ing by the self-righteous.
H. P. B. was, all the world knows, an inveterate
smoker. She consumed an immense number of cigar
ettes daily, for the rolling of which she possessed the
greatest deftness. She could even roll them with her
left hand while she was writing " copy " with her right.
Her devoted London physician, Dr. Mennell, has the
most unique present she could have given any person :
a box, with his monogram neatly carved on the lid,
which contains several hundred cigarettes that she
rolled for him with her own hands. She sent it to him
just before her death, and the Doctor has it laid by as a
souvenir of, doubtless, his most interesting and illustrious
patient.
While she was writing Isis Unveiled, at New York, she
would not leave her apartment for six months at a
stretch. From early morning until very late at night
she would sit at her table working. It was not an un
common thing for her to be seventeen hours out of the
twenty-four at her writing. Her only exercise was to
go to the dining-room or bath-room and back again to
her table. As she was then a large eater, the fat accu
mulated in great masses on her body : her chin doubled
and trebled ; a watery fat formed in her limbs and hung
in masses over her ankles ; her arms developed great
bags of adipose, which she often showed visitors and
laughed at as a great joke a bitter one as it proved in
after years. When Isis was finished and we began to see
ahead the certainty of our departure, she went one day
with my sister and got herself weighed : she turned the
scales at 245 pounds (17 stone 7), and then announced
that she meant to reduce herself to the proper weight
for travelling, which she fixed at 156 pounds (11 stone 2).
Her method was simple : every day, ten minutes after
each meal, she had a wineglass of plain water brought
her ; she would hold one palm over it, look at it mesmer
ically, and then drink it off. I forget just how many
weeks she continued this treatment, but finally she
asked my sister to go again with her to be weighed.
They brought and showed me the certificate of the shop
keeper who owned the scales, to the effect that " The
weight of Madame Blavatsky this day is 156 pounds ! "
So she continued until long after we reached India,
when the obesity reappeared and persisted, aggravated
with dropsy, until her death.
There was one aspect of her character which amazed
strangers, and made her very attractive to those who
loved her. I mean a sort of childish delight that she
exhibited when certain things pleased her very much.
She was sent once into transports of joy on receipt of a
box of caviare, sweet cakes, and other delicacies from
Russia, while we were at New York. She was for hav
ing us all taste them, and when I protested that the
fish-roes had the flavour of salted shoe-leather, she was
almost ready to annihilate me. A crumb of black bread
that chanced to be in a home newspaper she had had
sent her, suggested the entire home life at Odessa. She
described to me her beloved aunt Nadjeda, sitting late
at night in her room, reading the papers while nibbling
one of these very crusts ; and then the different rooms
in the house, the occupants, their habits and doings.
She actually wrapped the crumb in a bit of the news
paper and laid it under her pillow to dream upon.
In my Diary of 1878, I find an entry for Sunday, July
14, 1878, about a seaside trip we took with Wimbridge.
It says :
" A superb day, bright sun, cool, pleasant air, every
thing charming. We three took a carriage, drove to the
beach and all bathed. H. P. B. presented a most amus
ing appearance ; paddling about in the surf, with her
bare legs, and showing an almost infantile glee to be in
such a ' splendid magnetism.' "
At Madras she received the present of several toys in
scroll-saw fret-work, from her aunt. Some of comical
design she brought out to show all visitors until the
novelty had worn off. One, a wall-pocket in ebony and
calamander wood, hangs in her old bed-room at Adyar,
where I am now writing.
On her table in New York stood an iron savings-box,
modelled like a Gothic tomb or temple one cannot say
which which was to her the soune of constant delight.
It had a slit in the dome inside, and an innocent-looking
round table-top on a pillar. This was connected with a
crank on the outside, and if a coin were placed on it
and the crank turned, the coin would presently be
swept off through a slot and fall inside, frona whence it
could only be removed by unscrewing a certain small
plate at the bottom. We made this our collection-box for
the Arya Samaj, and H. P. B. but I shall let the re
porter of the N'. Y. Star speak for himself on this point.
In that paper for December 8, 1878, it is written :
" Madame Blavatsky, or, as she prefers to be called,
H. P. B. (she having sent the title of ' Madame ' to look
for that of ' Countess,' which she threw away before)
was enraptured with the idea. ' I will fill my little tem
ple with dollars,' she cried, ' and I shall not be ashamed
to take it to India.' The temple she referred to is a
small, but intricate structure, with an entrance, but no
exit, for money contributed to the Arya Samaj. It is
solidly constructed of cast-iron, and is surmounted by a
small ' Dev.' H. P. B. kindly explained to the reporter
that ' Dev ' was a Sanskrit word, differently interpreted
as god, or devil, or genie by different nations of the
East. The casual visitor to the Lamasery is frequently
invited to place a small coin on the top of the temple,
and to turn a crank. The result is invariably the great
glee of the Theosophs, the discomfiture of the casual
visitor, and the enrichment of the Arya Samaj, for the
coin disappears in the process."
The same writer, I find, says something nice about the
mural picture in dried leaves, of a tropical jungle, that
was made in our dining-room, and described in a recent
chapter. We thought of making a lottery among our
friends of the furniture of the Lamasery, and this was to
be one of the prizes. The Star reporter says :
" Perhaps one of the most remarkable things in all the
collection of unique prizes is one which has no claim to
be considered magical. It is a mural ornament, so
elaborately beautiful and yet so simple, that it seems
strange that it is not fashionable. On one of the walls
of the dining-room of the now famous flat is the repre
sentation of a tropical scene, in which appear an ele
phant, a tiger, a huge serpent, a fallen tree, monkeys,
birds and butterflies, and two or three sheets of water.
It is neither painted nor drawn, but the design was first
cut out in paper and then autumn leaves of various hues
were pasted on, while the water was represented by small
pieces of broken mirror. The effect is remarkably
beautiful, but the winner of the prize will probably need
magical art to remove it in good condition, for it has
been in its place so long that the leaves are dry and
brittle."
The jocund side of H. P. B.'s character was one of
her greatest charms. She liked to say witty things her
self and to hear others say them. As above remarked,
her salon was never dull save, of course, to those who
had no knowledge of Eastern literature and understood
nothing of Eastern philosophy, and to them time might
have dragged heavily when H. P. B. and Wilder, or Ur.
Weisse, or some other savant were discussing these
deeper depths and loftier heights of thought by hours
together. Yet even then she spoke so unconventionally,
and formulated her views with so much verve and start
ling parodox, that even if the listener could not follow
the thread of her thought, he must admire it ; as one
may the Crystal Palace pyrotechnics, although he does
not know the chemical processes employed to manufac
ture the pieces. She caught up and made her own any
quaint phrase or word as, for instance, " flapdoodle,"
" whistle-breeches," and several others which have come
to be regarded as her own invention. In our play-times,
/. e., after finishing our nightwork, or when visitors came
or, rarely, when she wanted to have a little rest, she
would tell me tales of magic, mystery, and adventure,
and in return, get me to whistle, or sing comic songs, or
tell droll stories. One of the latter became, by two
years' increment added on to the original, a sort of
mock Odyssey of the Moloney family, whose innumera
ble descents into matter, returns to the state of cosmic
force, intermarriages, changes of creed, skin, and capa
bilities, made up an extravaganza of which H. P. B.
seemed never to have enough. She would set me going
in presence of third parties, much to my disgust some
times, and enjoy their surprise at this rough and ready
improvisation. It was all recited in an Irish brogue, and
was a mere fanfarronade of every kind of nonsense ;
dealing extravagantly with the problems of macrocos
mic and microcosmic evolution : the gist of the whole
thing being that the Moloneys were related by marriage
to the Molecules, and that the two together generated
the supreme potency of Irish force, which controlled
the vicissitudes of all worlds, suns, and galaxies. It was,
as compared with the trifling story from which it devel
oped, like the giant Banyan tree as compared with its
tiny seed-germ. She got at last to call me Moloney,
both in speaking and writing, and I retaliated by calling
her Mulligan. Both nicknames were caught up by our
friends, and my old boxes of archives contain many
letters to her and myself, under those Hibernian
pseudonyms.
She was a splendid pianist, playing with a touch and
expression that were simply superb. Her hands were
models ideal and actual for a sculptor and never seen
to such advantage as when flying over the keyboard to
find its magical melodies. She was a pupil of Mosche
les, and when in London as a young girl, with her father,
played at a charity concert with Madame Clara Schu
mann and Madame Arabella Goddard in a piece of
Schumann's for three pianos.* During the time of our
relationship she played scarcely at all. Once a cottage
piano was bought and she played on it for a few weeks,
but then it remained closed ever after until sold, and
served as a double book-shelf. There were times when
* Some weeks after the above was published I learned from a mem
ber of her family that shortly before coming to America, II. P. 1!.
had made some concert tours in Italy and Russia under the pseudonym
of " Madame Laura."
she was occupied by one of the Mahatmas, when her
playing was indescribably grand. She would sit in the
dusk sometimes, with nobody else in the room beside
myself, and strike from the sweet-toned instrument im
provisations that might well make one fancy he was list
ing to the Gandhavas, or heavenly choristers. It was
the harmony of heaven.
She had a bad eye for colours and proportions in her
normal state, and very little of that fine aesthetic taste
which makes a woman dress herself becomingly. I have
gone to the theatre with her when I expected the house
to rise at us. She, a stout and remarkable looking wo
man, wearing a perky hat with plumes, a grand toilette
satin dress with much trimming, a long, heavy gold chain
about her neck, attached to a blue-enamelled watch, with
a monogram on the back in cheap diamonds, and on her
lovely hands a dozen or fifteen rings, large and small.
People might laugh at her aside, but if they caught her
stern eye and looked into her massive Calmuck face,
their laugh soon died away and a sense of awe and won
der possessed them.
She was at times generous to the extreme, lavishly so ;
at others the very opposite. When she had money she
seemed to regard it as something to be got rid of soon.
She told me that she spent within two years a legacy of
85,000 roubles (about 170,000 rupees) left her by her
grandmother, in desultory wandering over the world.
A good part of the time she had with her a huge New
foundland dog, which she led by a heavy golden chain !
She was a most downright, plain-spoken person, when
not exchanging politenesses with a new acquaintance, at
which times she was grande-dame to her finger-tips. No
matter how untidy she might be in appearance, she bore
the ineffaceable stamp of high birth ; and if she chose,
could be as dignified as a French duchesse. But in her
ordinary, everyday life, she was as sharp as a knife in her
sarcasm and like an exploding bomb in her moments of
anger. The one unpardonable sin, for her, was hypoc
risy and society airs. Then, she was merciless, and the
sources of various languages were exhausted to cover
the victim with contumely. She frequently saw as in a
mirror, clairvoyantly, the secret sins of men and women
whom she encountered ; and if they happened to be
particularly prone to speak of Theosophy with disdain
or of herself with contempt, she would pour the vials of
wrathful candour upon their heads. The " ower guid "
folk were her abhorrence, but for a poor, ignorant but
frank person, whether reputable or the opposite, she had
always a kind word and often a gift. Unconventionality
was with her almost a cult, and nothing pleased her more
than to do and say things to shock the prudish. For
example, I find an entry in my diary to the effect that,
on a certain evening, she put on her night-dress, went to
bed, and received a mixed company of ladies and gen
tlemen. This was after the fashion of royal and noble
dames of pre-revolutionary days in Europe. Her palpa
ble sexlessness of feeling carried all this off without
challenge. No woman visitor would ever see in her a
possible rival, no man imagine that she could be cajoled
by him into committing indiscretions. She swore like
the army in Flanders but meant no harm, and if her un
common predilection in this respect had not been so
much noticed and denounced by the sticklers for pro
priety themselves, as she clairvoyantly saw, sometimes
smug sinners behind closed doors she would doubtless
have given it up. It is in human-nature, and was in her
nature, superlatively, to keep doing forbidden things just
out of a spirit of revolt. I knew a lady once whose
child caught from the farm servants the habit of saying
wicked words. The mother, a most exemplary lady in
every respect, was heartbroken about it. Whipping and
other punishments only made matters worse, and no bet
ter result was obtained from the last expedient of wash
ing out the child's mouth with bar soap after he had been
heard swearing. At last some sensible friend advised
the parents to try what would come of paying no atten
tion whatever to the bad language. The plan was a
complete success, and within a few months the culprit
swore no more. H. P. B. felt herself in revolt to every
conventional idea of society, being in beliefs, tastes,
dress, ideals, and behaviour a social helot ; so she re
venged herself by showing her own commanding tal
ents and accomplishments, and causing society to fear
her. Secretly smarting for her lack of physical beauty,
she continually harped upon her " potatoe nose," as
though she defied criticism. The world was to her an
empty sham, its prizes but dross, her waking life a lugu
brious existence, her real life that of the night when,
leaving the body, she would go and sit at the feet of her
Masters. So she felt little else than scorn and profound
contempt for the blind bigots and narrow-thinking men
of science, who had not even a stray glimpse of the
truth, yet who would judge her with unrighteous judg
ment, and conspire to silence her by a conspiracy of
calumny. For clergymen as a body she felt hatred, be
cause, being themselves absolutely ignorant of the truths
of the spirit, they assumed the right to lead the spiritu
ally blind, to keep the lay conscience under control, to
enjoy revenues they had not earned, and to damn the
heretic, who was often the sage, the illuminatus, the
adept. We had one scrap-book into which we used to
paste paragraphs from the newspapers telling of the
crimes of clergymen and priests who had been brought
to justice, and before we left for India there was a large
collection of them.
H. P. B. made numberless friends, but often lost them
again and saw them turned into personal enemies. No
one could be more fascinating than she when she chose,
and she chose it when she wanted to draw persons to
her public work. She would be caressing in tone and
manner, and make the person feel that she regarded him
as her best, if not her only friend. She would even
write in the same tone, and I think I could name a num
ber of women who hold her letters saying that they are
to be her successors in the T. S., and twice as many men
whom she declared her " only real friends and accepted
chdlas." I have a number of such certificates, and used
to think them treasures until, after comparing notes with
third parties, I found that they had been similarly en
couraged, and I saw that all her eulogies were valueless.
With ordinary persons like myself and her other intimate
associates, I should not say she was either loyal or
staunch. We were to her, I believe, nothing more than
pawns in a game of chess, for whom she had no heart
deep love. She repeated to me the secrets of people of
both sexes even the most compromising ones that had
been confided to her, and she treated mine, such as they
are, I am convinced, in the same fashion. But she was
loyal to the last degree to her aunt, her other relatives,
and to the Masters ; for whose work she would have
sacrificed not only one, but twenty lives, and calmly seen
the whole human race consumed with fire, if needs be.
CHAPTER XXIX.
MADAM BLAVATSKY BECOMES AN AMERICAN CITIZEN. FORMATION OF THE BRITISH THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY. LAST DAYS IN NEW YORK.
IT was but natural that the Queen of our little Bohe
mia should have been asked for sittings by the Bo
hemian artists who clustered around her ; and so it
happens that she sat to Thos. Le Clear for her portrait
in oils, and to O'Donovan for a bronze portrait-medal
lion. The Diary entry for 24th February {1878) shows
that we two spent the evening at Walter Paris's studio,
and had a jolly time of it with some of the best artists
of New York. Most of them belonged to the famous
Tile Club, whose members meet monthly at each other's
studios, and paint designs on tiles supplied by the host
of the evening, whose property they become, and who
has them baked and glazed at his own expense. A
charming arrangement, by which each member of the
Club becomes in his turn, at trifling cost, the owner of
a set of signed paintings by good artists.
H. P. B. was inexpressibly amused by an incident connected with my farcical improvisations, alluded to above. One of the things she frequently called for was a burlesque of " speakmg mediumship," in which the mannerisms and platitudes of a certain class of platform speakers were travestied. On the evening in question we had as a visitor a London litterateur, a former editor of the Spectator and a University man. He had gone in for a good deal of investigation of Spiritualism and was a believer. I pretended to be controlled by the spirit of a deceased High Church clergyman and, with closed eyes and solemn tone, launched out into a tirade against the demoralising influences of the day, among which I accorded first place to the Theosophical Society. The promoters of this nefarious body, I made the pseudo spirit denounce in an especial degree, while upon H. P. B., its high priestess and head devil, I launched the thunderbolts of the major and minor excommunica tion. The old lady laughed until she cried, but our guest sat staring at me (as I noticed from time to time when I took a hasty glance at him between my almost closed lids), and at last broke out with the exclamation : " It 's terrible, it 's awfully real ; you really should not let him do it, Madame ! " " Do what ? " she asked. " Give way to this mediumship when his whole self is obsessed by so strong and so vindictive a personality of the spirit-world ! " This was too much for my mirth loving colleague, and she exploded with laughter. Finally, catching her breath, she cried out : " Stop ! For goodness' sake, stop, Olcott, or you will kill me ! " Just then I was at the middle of a fine burst of scorn over the pretended erudition and altruism of this " Rus sian schemer," but I stopped short and, turning to Mr. L., asked him in the quietest, most commonplace tone, for a match for my pipe. I almost lost my gravity on seeing his sudden start of amazement, and the sharp look of enquiry he shot into my face, telling as though he had spoken the words, his belief that I vi'as either mad, or the most extraordinary of mediums since I could so instantaneously " pass out of control." The sequel almost finished off H. P. B. The next morning, at eight o'clock, Mr. L. called, to walk down town with me and try his persuasive powers to make me throw up this mediumship which, he assured me, would destroy my hope of useful public work in the future ! The medium, he explained as though I had not then known it for at least twenty years was a veritable slave in the degree of his real mediumship ; the passive agent of disincarnate forces whose nature he had no means of testing, and as to whose domination he had no selec tive power. Say what I might, he would not be per suaded that the whole affair of last evening was nothing but a joke, one of the various divertisements employed by H. P. B. and myself to relieve the strain of our seri ous work ; he would have it that I was a medium, and so we had to let it rest. But to us it was a standing joke, and H. P. B. told it numberless times to visitors.
On the 5th April, T. A. Edison sent me his signed application for membership. I had had to see him about exhibiting his electrical inventions at the Paris Exposition of that year ; I being the honorary secretary to a Citizens' National Committee, which was formed at the request of the French Government, to induce the United States Congress to pass a bill providing for our country taking part in the first international exposition of the world's industries since the fall of the Empire and the foundation of the French Republic. Edison and I got to talking about occult forces, and he inter ested me greatly by the remark that he had done some experimenting in that direction. His aim was to try whether a pendulum, suspended on the wall of his pri vate laboratory, could be made to move by will-force. To test this he had used as conductors, wire of various metals, simple and compound, and tubes containing dif ferent fluids, one end of the conductor being applied to his forehead, the other connected with the pendulum. As no results have since been published, I presume that the experiments did not succeed. It may interest him, if he should chance to see this record, to know that in 1852 I met in Ohio a young man named Macallister, an ex-Shaker, who told me that he had discovered a certain fluid, by bathing his forehead with which he could trans mit thought to another person employing the same fluid at an agreed time, however distant the two might be apart. I remember writing an article on the subject un der the title of " Mental Telegraphing " to the old Spirit ual Telegraph newspaper, of the late Mr. S. B. Britten. Having been acquainted with several noted American inventors, and learnt from them the psychological pro cesses by which they severally got the first ideas of their inventions, I described these to Edison and asked him how his discoveries came to him. He said that often, perhaps while walking on Broadway with an acquaint ance, and talking about quite other matters, amid the din and roar of the street, the thought would suddenly flash into his mind that such a desired thing might be accomplished in a certain way. He would hasten home, set to work on the idea, and not give it up until he had either succeeded or found the thing impracticable.
On the 17th April we began to talk with Sotheran, General T., and one or two other high Masons about constituting our Society into a Masonic body with a Ritual and Degrees ; the idea being that it would form a natural complement to the higher degrees of the craft, restoring to it the vital element of Oriental mysticism which it lacked or had lost. At the same time, such an arrangement would give strength and permanency to the Society, by allying it to the ancient Brotherhood whose lodges are established throughout the whole world. Now that I come to look back at it, we were in reality but planning to repeat the work of Cagliostro, whose Egyptian Lodge was in his days so powerful a centre for the propagation of Eastern occult thought. We did not abandon the idea until long after removing to Bombay, and the last mention of it in my Diary is an entry to the effect that Swami Dyanand Sarasvati had promised me to compile a Ritual for the use of our New York and London members. Some old colleagues have denied the above facts, but, although they knew it not, the plan was seriously entertained by H. P. B. and myself, and we relinquished it only when we found the Society grow ing rapidly by its own inherent impetus and making it impolitic for us to merge it into the Masonic body.
One evening H. P. B. made a pretty phenomenon of duplication. A French physician, Dr. B., was one of a party of nine visitors at our rooms, and sat near H. P. B.'s writing-table, so that the standing gas-light shone upon a large gold sleeve-button, bearing his initials, that he wore. H. P. B.'s eye being caught by its glitter, she reached across the table, touched the button, and then opening her hand, showed him and the rest of us a duplicate of the same. We all saw it, but she would not give it to either of us, and presently re-opening her hand, the Mdyd had disappeared. One much more in teresting thing she did for me, one evening when we two were alone. From time to time she had told me tales of adventure and doings about a number of persons ; some in India, others in Western countries. This even ing she was shuffling a pack of cards in her hands in an aimless sort of way, when suddenly she held the pack open towards me and showed me the visiting card of a certain British officer's wife, who had chanced to see a Mahatma in Northern India and fallen offensively in love with his splendid face. The card bore her name, and, in a lower corner, that of her husband's regiment, partly scratched out as with a knife, so that I might not be able to identify the lady if I should ever meet her in India. The shuffling went on, and every minute or two she would open the pack and show me the visiting cards of other persons known to us by name ; some were glazed, some plain ; some with names engraved in script, others in square lettering ; some type-printed, some black-bordered, some large, and others small. It was a marvellous and quite unique phenomenon. Yet how queer it was that precious psychic force so hard to generate, so easy to lose should have been wasted to objectify, for a brief moment in each case, these astral phantoms of common visiting cards, when the same vol ume of force might have been employed to compel some great scientist to believe in the existence of the rec ords of the A'kas'a and devote his energies to spiritual research. My respected sister, Mrs. Mitchell, who, with her husband and children, occupied a flat in the same apartment-house with us, was one day shown by H. P. B. a collection of gems and jewelry which, she says, must have represented a value of at least _;^io,ooo, and which she thought were part of her family inheritance. So little did she suspect that they were merely illusionary, that she was even incredulous when I told her that H. P. B. owned no such property. If she had, I am sure she would never have allowed herself to be put to such straits as she was.
The nearer we approached the time for our change of base, the more vehement became H. P. B.'s praise of India, the Hindus, the entire Orient and Orientals as a whole, and her disparagement of Western people as a whole, their soci.il customs, religious tyranny, and ideals. There were stormy evenings at the Lamasery, among which stands out one episode very distinctly. Walter Paris, the artist, and one of the best of fellows, had lived at Bomb.ty some years as Government Architect, and was glad to talk with us about India. But not having our ' excessive reverence tor the countr)' and sympathy for the people, he would often offend H. P. B.'s sensitive ness by remarks on what I now know to be A.iglo-Indian lines. One evening he was talking about an old servant of his who had committed some stupidity in harnessing or saddling a horse, and quietly remarked that he had slashed the man with his whip. Instantly, as if she had received the blow across her own face, H. P. B. sprang up, stood before him, and in a speech of about rive min utes gave him such a scathing rebuke as to make him sit speechless. She stigmatised the act as one of cow ardice, and made it serie as a text for a neat discourse on the treatment of the Oriental races by the Anglo Indian ruling class. This was not a mere casual out burst adapted to the Western market : she preserved the same tone from lirst to last, and I have often heard her at Allahabad. Simla, Bombay, Madras, and elsewhere, use the same boldness of speech to the highest Anglo Indian ofiBcials.
One wav H. P. B. had of beguiling tedious hours after Isis f 'wrf/.V./ was off our hands, was to draw cari catures on plavir.c-cards, bringing the pips into the pic tures. Several of these clever productions were very laughable. One, made out of the Ten of Clubs, was a minstrel performance ; the grotesque contortions of the " end men," the solemn caddishness of the " Interro gator,'' and the amiable vacuity of the intermediates being admirably delineated. Another was a Spiritual istic stance, with banjo, accordeons, and tambourines flying through the air, a bucket inverted over one " in vestigator's " head, and an impish little elemental grin ning from a lady's lap as she holds his forked tail in her hand under the impression that it is part of the body of some departed friend. A third card made out of a Seven of Hearts, I think shows two fat monks at a table laden with turkey, ham, and other delicacies, while bottles of wine stand ready at hand, and others are cooling in an ice vase on the floor. One of the rev erend fathers, who has a most animal cast of features, is putting his hand behind him to receive a billet-doux from a prim servant-maid in cap and apron. Still an other represents a policeman catching a runaway thief by the foot ; another, a couple of swell Tommies walk ing with their sweethearts ; a third, a patriarchal negro, running with his black grandchild in his arms, etc., etc. Quite recently I have learnt that her late father had a special talent in this same direction, so it was quite easy to account for her cleverness. I told her I thought it a pity that she should not make up an entire pack in this fashion, as it would surely yield her a goodly sum as copyright. She said she should, but the mood did not last long enough to bring the desired result.
On the Sth July she took out her naturalisation papers, went with me to the Superior Court, and was duly sworn in as a citizen of the United States of America. She describes it thus in my Diary : " H. P. B. was made to swear eternal affection, devotion and defence to and of the U. S. Constitution, forswear every particle of allegiance to the Russian Emperor, and was made a ' Citizen of the U. S. of America.' Received her naturalisation papers and went home happy." Of course, the next day's American papers were full of ac counts of the event, and reporters were sent to interview the new citizen, who made them all laugh with her naire opinions upon politics and politicians.
The formation of the British Theosophical Society, in London (now called the London Lodge T. S.), occu pied a good deal of my attention during the early summer months of 1S7S. This, our first Branch, was finally organised on June 27, by Dr. J. Storer Cobb, LL.D., Treasurer of the T. S,, whose visit to London at the time was availed of to make him my official agent for this purpose. Mr. Sinnett has kindly favoured me with the following copy of the record of the proceed ings from the :\Iinute Book of the Lodc;e in his official custody ; which I publish, because of its historical interest :
Meeting of Fellows,
London, june 27, 1S7S.
Present : Fellows, J. Storer Cobb, Treasurer (New York Society), C. C. Massey, Dr. C. Carter Blake, Dr. George Wyld, Dr. H. J. Billing, and E. Kislingbury.
Fellow J. Storer Cobb in the chair, read letters from Mr. Yarker, Dr. K. Mackenzie, Captain Irwin, and Mr. R. P. Thomas, expressing regret at their unavoidable absence, and sympathy with the objects of the meeting ; also a letter from Rev. W. Stainton Moses, stating that he was unable to take part in the meeting, having re- signed his Fellowship in the New York Society.
Mr. Treasurer Cobb having stated President Olcott's instructions as to the basis of an English branch society, as communicated since a former meeting of Fellows in this place, proposed to retire, as it was not his intention to become a member of the new branch. On his being invited to remain as a listener, an informal discussion ensued, and it was finally Resolved, on the motion of Fellow Massey, seconded by Dr. H. J. Billing, " that, in the opinion of the English Fellows of the Theosophi- cal Society of New York, present at this meeting, it is desirable to form a Society in England, in connection and in sympathy with that body.''
In accordance with the paper of instructions received from the President, the meeting proceeded to discuss the question of a President of the Branch Society, and on the ballot being taken, C. C. Massey was found to be chosen President.
Mr. Massey, in accepting the office, made a few re- marks and took the chair. It was proposed by him, and seconded by Dr. Carter Blake, that Miss Kislingbury be Secretary to the Branch Society. This was carried and accepted by Miss Yi.,pro tern.
The meeting was adjourned until further advices from New York, and the Secretary was requested to fur- nish a copy of these minutes to Col. Olcott (President) and a copy of the Resolution, above recorded, to the absent English members.
The following memorandum was then drawn up and signed, and given to the Secretary to forward to Col. Olcott, viz. :
" London, Vune 27, 1878.
"To
" Col. Henry S. Olcott,
President of the T. S., New York. " I hereby certify that this day has been held a meet- ing at which has been formed an English branch of the above Society, of which Branch, Fellow Charles Carle- ton Massey has been, by ballot of the Fellows present, elected President.
(Signed) " John Storer Cobb,
Treasurer, N. Y. Society.
(Signed) C. C. Massey."
My official letters recognising the British Theosophi- cal Society and ratifying the proceedings at the above reported meeting, were written July 12, 1878, and sent to Mr. C. C. Massey and Miss E. Kislingbury, the President and the Secretary.
There is an entry in my Diary for October 25th which is interesting as showing the faculty of clairvoyance that H. P. B. sometimes exercised. It says :
" O'Donovan, Wimbridge, H. P. B., and I were at dinner when the servant brought in a letter from Massey left at the moment by the postman. Before it came, H. P. B. announced its coming and nature, and when I received it and before the seal was broken, she said it contained a letter from Dr. Wyld, and read that also without looking at it."
I recollect taking the cover from the hand of the ser- vant and laying it beside my plate, intending to defer reading it until we rose from the table. Between it and H. P. B. stood a large earthenware water-pitcher, yet while it lay there she first read the contents of Massey's letter and then those of the enclosure from Dr. Wyld. I find, moreover, that the covering letter had Mahdtmic writing on one of the pages, and that I returned it to the sender with a statement of the facts, signed by my- self and Mr. AVimbridge.
It is a rather notable coincidence that several astrolo- gers, clairvoyants, and Indian ascetics should have prophesied that H. P. B. would die at sea. I find one of the sort noted on the page for November 2, 1878. A gentleman psychic, a friend of Wimbridge's, " foretold H. P. B.'s death at sea a sudden death. Doubted that she would even reach Bombay." Majji, the Benares Yog{ni, made the same prognostic as to the place of H. P B.'s death and even the time, but neither proved correct. No more did a card-reader at New York who predicted H. P. B.'s death by murder before 1886. In entering the affair H. P. B. very naturally put two points of exclamation after the word murder, and cynically- added the remark: " Nothing like clairvoyance ! "
One of our visitors was more successful as a prophet, but he did not try his faculty on H. P. B. Here is the description I wrote of him in the Diarj- :
" A mystical Hebrew physician. A strange, very strange man. Has prescience as to visitors, deaths, and a spiritual insight as to their maladies. Old, thin, stoop- ing ; his hair thin, fine, grizzled and stands out in all directions from his noble head. Rouges his cheeks to correct their unnatural pallor. Has a habit of throwing his head far back and looking up into space as he listens or converses. His complexion is waxen, his skin trans- parent and extremely thin. He wears summer clothing in the depth of winter. He has the peculiar habit of saying when about to answer : ' Veil, see he-ere, tee-ar ! ' "
For thirty years he had studied the Kabbalah, and his conversations with H. P. B. were largely confined to its mysteries. He said one evening in my hearing that despite his thirty years' researches he had not discovered the true meanings that she read into certain texts, and that illumined them with a holy light.
Our departure having been finally decided upon, I began in the autumn of 187S to get my worldly affairs into order. An active correspondence was kept up with our Bombay and Ceylon friends (a number of Buddhists and Hindus joined the T. S. by letter), our small library was shipped, and little by little our household goods were sold or given away. We made no parade of intentions, but our rooms were thronged more than ever by the friends and acquaintances to whom they became known. H. P. B.'s entries in my Diary during my fre- quent absences from New York in the last weeks, testify to the nervous eagerness she felt to get away, and her fears that my plans might miscarry. In the entry of October 2 2d she writes speaking of the urgency of our Mahatmas : " N went off watch and in came S with orders from to complete all by the early part of December. Well, H. S. O. is playing his great final stake." There is reference here to the change of person- alities in the Intelligences controlling the H. P. B. body, and the entries in different handwritings support this idea. A similar entry occurs on November 14th, where it is said that we must use every exertion to get away by the 20th December at latest. There is a final paragraph on that page to this effect : " O gods, O India of the golden face, is this really the beginning of the end ! " On November 21st other urgent orders came through the same channel, and we were bidden to begin packing our trunks. Various persons wished to accompany us to India, and some made efforts to do so, but the party finally comprised but four H. P. B., Miss Bates, an English governess, Mr. Wimbridge, an artist and archi- tect, and myself. On the 24th we were at it, and the following day the first of our intended party of four. Miss Bates, sailed for Liverpool, taking two of H. P. B.'s trunks with her. Again and again came the orders to hasten our departure. Writing about the unexpected
1 find entries in the Diary sliowing that I ^ot scarcely any n-sl iliiring these latter d.iys, sitting nj) all night to write letters, rushing away to Philadelphia and other towns, snatcliinga morsel of food as] could get it : while throughout the whok' narrative sounds the jiooiu of the ordi'rs to depart before Ihe fixeil day of grai e the 17th should |iass away. 1 1. J'. I'.'s writing grows serateliy, and on the page for Deei-mher isth ] notice^ two of the above-uientioncd variants of luir si-ript, wlii( h show that her body was occupied by two of the Mahatrnas on that same evening. I had bought an h'.dison jihonograph of the original pattern, and on that evening (piite a num- ber of our members and rrien<ls, auujiig them a Mr. Johnston, whom lOdison had sent as his personal rc'pre- sentative (he being unavoidably absent), talked into IIm; voice-receivc.T messages lo our then known and unknown brothers in India. The several tinfoil sheets, [irop- erly marked for idcntific.ition, were carefully rcniovcc! from the cylinder, packed up, and they ar(' si ill kejit in the Adyar labrary, for the edification of future times.*
* Quite rcrcjiilly viz., ill M:iy, 1B95 I sunt tlicHi; tinfuil recnrds to Edison's London offii:c, to sec if they inigjit iint hu received on one of the modern wax cylinders and mi saved fur postcrily. Unfor- tunately, notliing could he doin: wiLli tliein, the Iiidciil,iti(in.s made by tlic voices having liccome almost (laltcncd out. It is a great |iity, for otherwise wo might have had duplicates l:ikcii off llic original, and thus have had II. 1'. li.'s strong voire sjicaUiiig audibly at our local iiicctines all over the world on " White hotiis Day," tlic anniversary of her death.
Among the voices kept are those of H. P. li. a very sharp and clear record, myself, Mr. Judge; and his brother John, Prof. Alex. ^Vilder, Miss Sarah Cowell, two Messrs. Laffan, Mr. Clough, Mr. D. A. Curtis, Mr. Griggs, Mrs. S. R. Wells, Mrs. and Miss Amer, Dr. J. A. Weisse, Mr. Shinn, Mr. Terriss, Mr. Maynard, Mr. E. H. Johnston, Mr. O'Donovan, etc., of whom all were clever, and some very well known as authors, journalists, painters, sculptors, musicians, and in other ways.
The 17th December was our last day on American soil. H. P. B.'s entry says : " Great day ! Olcott packed up. . . . what next ? All dark but tranquil." And then comes, written in large letters, the heart-cry of joy, CoNSUMMATUM EST ! The closing paragraph reads thus : " Olcott returned at 7 p.m. with the tickets for the British Steamboat, the CiinaJa, and wrote letters until 1 1 130. Curtis and Judge passed the evening. Maynard took II. P. B. [See the writers always speaking of her in the third person] to dine at his house. She returned home at 9. He made her a present of a tobacco-pouch. Charles (our big cat) lost I ! At near 12, midnight, H. S. 0. and H. P. B. took leave of the chandelier and drove off in a carriage to the steamer." So closes the first volume of the history of the Theosphical Society with the departure of its Founders from America.
Behind them lay three years of struggles ; of obstacles surmounted ; of crude plans partly worked out ; of literary labour ; of desertions of friends ; of encounters with adversaries ; of the laying of broad foundations for the structure that in time was destined to arise for the gathering in of the nations, but the possibility of which
T. S. HISTORY AT ONE GLANCE.
T. S. formed
Shrinking
Jsis published ....
British T. S. Cour first branch) formed \
Founders leave U. S. A. . '
Headquarters fixed at Bombay
Theosophist founded
Founders visit Ceylon
Do. Simla . ...
Headquarters fixed at Madras .
H. S. O.'s first long Indian tour
Coulomb and Missionary plot
H. P. B. settles in Europe .
H. S. O.'s second Indian tour .
American Section formed .
H. S. O.'s third Indian tour
H. P. B. removes to London
Blavatsky Lodge formed .
Annie Besant joins the T. S.
British Section formed
H. P. B. dies ....
H. S. O. goes around the world
European Section formed .
Annie Besant's first Indian tour
iudicial Committee meets in
ondon to try W. Q. Judge
1876
1884
1887
1893
1894
52
95
107
124
136
158
206
241
279
304
352
394
*The Branch statistics are compiled annually in the month of December for
the President's Annual Address.
was then unsuspected by them. For they had builded
better than they knew better, at any rate, than I knew.
What lay in the future we foresaw not. The words of
H. P. B. show that : " All dark, but tranquil." The
marvellous extension of our Society had not entered
even into our dreams. An ex-officer of ours has pub-
lished the statement that the Society had died a natural
death before we left for India. The diagram opposite
will show that, while it had dwindled to almost nothing,
it began to revive from the moment its executive centre
was shifted to India.
We passed a wretched night on the ship, what with
the bitter cold, damp bedding, no heating apparatus
working, and the banging of tackle and rub-a-dub-dub
of the winches getting in cargo. Instead of leaving
early, the steamer did not get away from her wharf until
2.30 P.M. on the i8th. Then, having lost the tide, she
had to anchor off Coney Island and crossed the Sandy
Hook bar only at noon on the 19th. At last we were
crossing the blue water towards our Land of Promise ;
and, so full was my heart with the prospect, that I did
not wait on deck to see the Navesink Highlands melt
out of view, but descended to my cabin and searched for
Bombay on my Map of India.
INDEX.
Adept, a noble one, 248 ; per-
sonal description of, 379 ; a
Hungarian, teaches me, 275 ;
writing genuine and false,
260
Adepts Lodge, universal, 18 ;
African section of, 75-78 ;
how they can legitimately in-
terfere, 78 ; are men, not
spirits, 237 ; their hand-
writing varies from time to
time, 256 ; precipitates writing
through mediums, 257
Aksakoff, Hon. A., asks our
help, 79-81
Alden, Mr. W. L., his strange
acquaintance, 123
Ange, Marie, case of, 329
Angels, entertaining unawares,
125
Arabs, starving, rescued, 298-g ;
Ari Magic, Mrs. Britten's story
about, 186 ; marked a literary
epoch in America, 188 ; plagi-
arisms in, 189 ; personality of
the author, 193 ; pretended
portrait of the author, 194 ;
Mrs. Britten's letter to Lady
Caithness, 200
Authority, pretended, adds no
value, 261
B
B., Signer, warns me against
H. P. B., 64
Ballard, Miss, meets H. P. B. in
1873. 21
Beard, Dr. , H. P. B. attacks him,
32, 67
Bells, the astral, 425 ; of M. A.
Oxon, 427
Bilocations, 383
Blavatsky, Madame, her personal
appearance, 4 ; her sexless-
ness, 6 ; her battle wounds, 9 ;
professes herself a spiritualist,
12-15 i ordered to New York,
20 ; fails to establish a society
at Cairo, 22 ; had no fore-
knowledge of the future T. S.,
25 ; at Paris in 1873, 27 ; her
485
486
Index
Blavatsky, Madame Continued.
impulsive generosity, 29 ; in-
herits her patrimony, 30 ; per-
sonal traits, 33 ; classification
of her psychic powers, 37 ;
phenomena at Philadelphia,
40-54; causes herself to vanish,
46 ; suggestion, hypnotic, 47,
49 ; the real H. P. B., 50 ;
her second marriage, 55 ; calls
herself a spiritualist, 69 ; her
sort of spiritualism, 71 ; her
"first occult shot," 102; her
literary history, 103 ; an inter-
preter for the adepts, 106 ; her
linguistic ability, 106 ; her style
of writing, 107 ; first open pro-
paganda of Eastern ideas, 108 ;
launching of the occult idea,
no; denies that she was founder
of the T. S., 137 ; changes of
personality, 212; passionate na-
ture, 213, 257 ; admits that her
body was occupied by others,
216 ; in early youth associated
with "familiars," 222 ; her
"double lives" in Mingrelia
and similar cases, 227 ; draw-
ing upon the stored-up wis-
dom in the ether, 230 ; her
interest better served by ac-
knowledging quotations, 230 ;
Hindu theory of the " knower, "
233 ; known in but three ca-
pacities, 252 ; the " fiery Dol-
goroukis," 258 ; her qualifica-
tions as an agent for the
adepts, 259 ; danger of vio-
lently suppressing personal
defects, 263 ; was she killed at
Mentana ? 264 ; proof of at-
tempt to enter Tibet in 1854,
265 ; obsession and possession
defined, 266 ; A'ves'a the
proper Sanskrit word for the
occupation of another body,
269 ; Eastern rules for doing
this, 272, 273 ; signs of " oc-
cupancy " of her body by
others, 289-293 ; adepts some-
times speak of her as a man,
293; her " phenomena" calcu-
lated to injure her with Orien-
tals, 306 ; visits " M. A.
Oxon," in double, 324 ; walks
through rain remains dry,
350 ; how she appeared at
home, 408 et seq.j offering tea
ad lib, 410 ; queer housekeep-
ing, 411 ; the charm of her
salon^ 424 ; explanation of
astralbells, 426 ; special errand
to Buffalo, 440 ; personal traits,
449 ; not an ascetic, 451 ;
money box for Arya Samaj,
455 ; a splendid pianist, 458 ;
merciless on hypocrites, 460 ;
her many " only friends," 462 ;
her portraits made, 464 ; love
for the Hindus, 471 ; talent
for caricatures, 472 ; becomes
an American citizen, 473 ;
clairvoyance, 476 ; death of,
falsely prophesied, 476
Bodily "occupation" fully ex-
plained, 270
Britten, Mrs. Hardinge, putative
author of Art Magic, 185
Brown, E. Gerry, relations with,
73
Index
487
Buddha's rebuke of the public
display of Iddhi, 307
Evolution of the self, ancient
rules for, 315
Cairo, H. P. B. fails to establish
a society at, 22
Centres, the six vital, or Chak-
ras, 276, 365
D
Das-Pandit, S. C, deciphers a
Tibetan line, 263
Dead, relations with, how viewed
in East and West, 304 ; Eastern
religions unanimously hostile
to it, 305
"Double," projection of, 374;
what D'Assier says, 374 ;
"Phantasms of the Living,"
374 ; projection no sign of
high spirituality, 375 ; adept
appears and disappears, 376 ;
adept visits me in astral body,
377 ; projection of, common,
383 ; I project my own, 385,
390, 391 ; Des Mousseaux on,
388 ; my double seen by many
persons, 392
Eddy Homestead, description
of, 7 ; phantasms seen at, 8
Edison, T. A., on mental tele-
graphy, 467.
Elementals, and elementaries,
72 ; as servants, 270 ; good and
bad, attracted to certain trees,
316; shown me, III; when
first defined by us, 102
Felt, Mr. J. H., on the Egyptian
Canon of Proportion, 1 15-1 17 ;
makes a personal explanation, 1
126-131 ; fails to make good
his promises, 139
Fire-balls, appearance of, 326
Forces, control of nature's brute,
343
Founders, first meeting of the,
I ; last days in Neir York,
478 ; leave for India, 481
Germain, Count St., calumnies
against, 241
Ghost of " Old Shep," 333
H
Handwriting, adepts genuine
and false, 260 ; varies from
time to time, 256 ; precipitated
through mediums, 257 ; variation of the H. P. B. script, Isis Unveiled, the writing of,
202, etseq.; germ of the subsequent work, 203 ; how the
quotations were obtained, 207 ;
how she worked at it, 209 ; acknowledges her own unfitness for writing, 223 ; books
Index
Isis Unveiled Continued.
for reference phenomenally
produced, 209 ; help of adepts,
210 ; MSS. written for her,
while asleep, 211 ; her description of her manner of work,
213; the " luminous self," 216 ;
superfluous copy destroyed,
217 ; the work rewritten, 218 ;
various theories of its produc-
tion analysed, 221 ; jumbledup MSS. required infinite corrections, 224 ; alleged
plagiarisms, 226 ; was it written
by mediumship ? 236 ; a spirit
helper, 238 ; variants of H.
P. B. script, 243 ; H. P. B.'s
body occupied by others, 244 ;
the various "somebodies" who
did this, 245 ; II. P. B. lends
her body like a typewriter, 246; identifying the "somebodies," 247 ; H. P. B.
sometimes wrote from dictation,
249 ; critical analysis of the English of /nV, 252 ; a collaborated work, of which the
personality of H. P. B. was
the mould, 255 ; sensation on its appearance sale unprecedented, 294 ; criticisms, 296
J
Jenny, little, and her mate, 430 ;
touching death of, 429
Judge, Mr. W. Q. , excuses himself for inaction, 143
Jugglers, Egyptian, pretended
expose, 332
K
Kabbalist, a mystical, 477
Karma, taught from the first,
237 ; makes a money present,
444 ; dips into poetry, 444
King, John, an elemental (?), 9
" Lamasery " at New York, life
at, 409 et seq. , description of,
423
Leaf picture, another description
of, 456
Lebanon, Countess Paschkoffs
adventure with H. P. B. in,
334
Liebert, Mile. P., fails to produce spirit photographs, 195 ;
defies H. P. B. to reproduce
phenomenally the pretended
photographs of the author of
Art Magic, Kfl; H. P. B. does
it, 198 ; this portrait fades out
and is made to reappear, igg
Light, an inrush of, 248
M
Mahatma, K. H., knows English, 262
Massey, Mr. C. C, a founder of
the T. S., 59, 134
Masters, blameless for agents'
mistakes, 77
Maya or illusion, 360 ; theory of,
433
Mediums, a plea for, 82 ; choosing, for St. Petersburg, 84
Index
489
Mediumship, a danger, 8j ; and
adeptship irreconcilable, 191 ;
and physiology, 191 ; in real,
there is a lowering of the
medium's temperature, 92 ; of
Mrs. Youngs, 85 ; of Mrs.
Thayer, 88-92 ; mock, 465
Meerut, my lecture at, 405
Memories, active and latent, 231
Memory, a lapse of, 381
Mental telegraphy, 467 ; Edison
on, 467
Metallic nucleus required for
metallic phenomena, 355
Metals, transmutation of, 355, 356
Mind, duplex action of, 234;
and will, their functions, 140
Moloney, the Odyssey of, 457
Moses, Mr. Stainton, 60 ; our
intercourse with, 300 ; his
mediumship, 311, 312 ; curious
resemblance between his and
our teachers, 320
N
Nature, dead child a failure of,
283
O
" Occupation," bodily, fully ex-
plained, 270
O'Donovan, the sculptor, teases
H. P. B., 412
" Odour of sanctity," 329
Orient, all Western occultism
derived from, 105
Palm, Baron de, connection with
the society, 147 ; biography,
148 ; deaths, 149 ; cremation
first determined upon, 150;
obstacle, New York Society
backs out, 151 ; obsequies,
" Egyptian funeral," 1 51-159 ;
a riot averted, 155; my dis-
course, 156 ; estate bankrupt,
159 ; no literary talent or
scholarship, 161 ; calumny
that he had written Isis Un-
veiled, 162 ; shady antece-
dents, 163; cremation, 166-184
Paracelsus, is he dead ? 240
Paschkoff, Countess, her ad-
venture with H. P. B. in the
Lebanon, 334
Passports, diplomatic, sent me,
479-
Personality, changes in H. P.
B.'s, 212 ; and individuality
contrasted, 285
Phenomena, rain making, 61 ;
remarkable acrostic, 74 ; a
ring found in a rose, 94 ; dia-
monds set into a plain ring,
96 ; the varied of the West,
98 ; Orientals discouraged
them, 99 ; the elementals
shown me. III ; pencils dupli-
cated, 245 ; 11. P. B. writes a
Hindi note, 262 ; a misty form
rises from H. P. B.'s body,
267 ; black Hindu hair cut
from H. P. B.'s head, 267 ;
resuscitation of a dead Rajah,
274 ; story of the s'andalwood
bowl, 306 ; scents from the
bodies of psychics, 325, 327,
328 ; three fireballs, 326 ; evo-
cation of picture of ancient city
by H. P. B., 355 ; H. P. B.
490
Index
Phehomena G'fifi/uirJ.
makes perfumed beads, 336 ;
tissues, 338-340 ; control of
nature's brute forces, 343 ; toy
sheep made, 344 ; hybrid
sugar-tongs made, 346 ; her
mystic ring made, 347 ; har-
monicon made, 349 ; chair
unwetted in rain storm, 350 ;
Chinese pictures made, 351 ;
portraits deranged, 35:; ; a
letter duplicated, 352 ; a five
page letter copied, 353 ; water-
colours made, 354 ; letter to
adept phenomenally answered,
359 ; lock of beard suddenly
lengthened, 361 ; precipitation
in colours, 362 ; picture of an
astral body made in satin, 364 ;
silver coin made, 371 ; thought
transference, 372 ; thought
reading at a distance, 414 ; a
written paper made to appear
on a wall, 414 ; H. V. B.
duplicates stamped letters,
417 ; butterfly phenomenon,
15 ; grapes phenomenally
made, 17 ; letters phenomen-
ally dealt with in transit, 36 ;
at Philadelphia, 40-54 ; por-
trait of deceased produced, 5S ;
adept appears and disappears,
376 ; adept visits me in astral
body, 377 ; I project my own
double, 385, 3go, 391 ; hunters,
selfishness of, 309 ; an ink-
spoiled dress restored, 431 ;
H. P. B. befooled by, in the
desert, 432 ; illusive duplica-
tion of money, 434 ; money
phenomenally supplied, 435 :
" John King" gives money,
441 ; golden writings made,
445 ; a needed address given,
446 ; Turkish pipes, etc., pro-
duced, 447 ; reduction of
weight, 453 ; gold sleeve
button duplicated, 469 ; visit-
ing cards made, 470
Phonograph, messages to India
talked into, 4S0
Picture in dried leaves, 420
Platonist, an old spirit, 239 ;
the spirit helper, was he an
adept? 242
Portrait, adept gives me his,
371 ; ^Ir. Schmieken paints
portraits of two adepts, 372
Powers, psychic, must be re-
strained, 30S
Precipitation of pictures, 358 et
seq, ; of Tiruvallavar yogi's
portrait, 367 ; pictures in
colours, 362 ; picture of an
astral body, 364
Press propaganda, 67
Psychology, masters of, 310
Pujusha and Prakriti, 355
Reincarnation, 277 ; the doctrine
not taught us at New York,
27S ; our early version, 279 ;
active discussion in iSyS, 2S2 ;
when doctrine was first adopted
by us, 284 : Buddhist Oite-
chism on, 2S4 ; when first put
forth by A. P. Sinnett, 2S6 ;
post mortem journeys of soul,
287 ; when first taught by A. O.
Index
491
Reincarnation Coniimicd.
Hume, 287 ; H. P. B. honest
in early repudiation of, 28S
Repercussion exemplified and
explained, 388 ; on physical
body, case of, 390
Resuscitation of a dead Rajah,
274
Reynolds, Mary, case of, 22g
Roff, Mary, case of, 22S
Samaj, the Arya, a sectarian
body, 398-403
Saras^■ati, Swami Dyanand, 394
(■/ scq. : bitterly reproaches us
for eclecticism, 406
Scents from the bodies of
psychics, 325, 327, 328
Shell, the, 217
Sheppard, Jesse, 63
Slade, Dr., the medium chosen
for the St. Petersburg commit-
tee, loi
Spark, the silvery, in the brain,
366
" Speer circle," evils of mixed
circles, etc., 317
Spirit, the supreme factor in phe-
nomena, 357
Spiritualism, Mr. Owen throws a
blight upon, 35
Temperaments, and elementals,
439
Theosophical Society, its origin,
113 ; I suggest its formation,
118 ; published reports of its
lormation, 119; original basis
of, 120 ; official report of or-
ganisation proceedings, 121 et
scq. ; oflicers elected, 135 ;
President's inaugural address,
136 ; organisation dwindles,
butvitality intensely sustained,
141 ; the New York nucleus
inactive, for reasons shown,
143 ; the seed planted at New
York in time germinates, 144 ;
the policy of secrecy adopted,
145 ; seal adopted, 146 ; secrecy
an innocent precaution, 146 ;
devotion to it the best path
towards the adepts, 294 ; New
York, headquarters of, 330 ;
spiritualists withdraw, 330 ;
headquarters life an ideal one,
331 ; ground plan of New York
house, 378 ; British, when
formed, 398 ; its declared ob-
jects, 399 ; oHicial report on,
473 ; early declaration of its
principles, 400, 401 ; routine
of the " Lamasery " at New
York, 409 ; New York head-
quarters described, 421, 422 ;
project to unite with Masonry,
46S ; history of sham at one
glance, 4S2
Thought transference, 372 ; read-
ing at a distance, 414
Treasure buried, its finding de-
pends on Karma, 438
V
Vikramaditya, King, conquers an
obstinate princess, 271
\V
Wilder, Prof. A., described, 412