Thursday, April 26, 2012

Rabindranath in England 4th time (contd-9) -1920

Prof. and Mrs. Hare Leonard invited Rabindranath to come to Bristol and spend  a week there. In respose to the invitation Rabindranath went with Pratima Devi and Pearson to Bristol. Some days ago they had come to Santiniketan.. The girls of the Clifton Boarding School staged the drama 'The King of the dark Chamber" in presence of Rabindranath. Pearson sent a description of this drama to Andrews in  Santiniketan for publishing and this was published in the Aswin issue of Santiniketan.. On that day Rabindranath went to visit the burial of Ram Mohan Roy. In the Arno's Vale Cemetery Prtima devi, Pearson, Kiron sankar Roy, and Kedar Nath Dsgupta signed the visitor's book but Rabindranath did not sign in it. On this occasion Rabindranath was introduced with Prof. Lloyed Morgan, Arnold Thomas to whom he explained his ideals of education. Having visited the Girl School Rabindranath made arrangements for admission of Manju, daughter of Surendranath, in that school. Mrs Leonards resided very near to the School and she was given the charge of her local guardian. 
They came back on the next day to London. They were invited to a dinner party in Chelsea, London, in the house of Miss Coleman, a friend of  Miss Bower, a sculptor. Miss Bower had made a beautiful sculpture of  Manju. She was making arrangement of making  a sculpture of Rabindranath. Pearson wrote to Andrews ;
" Rabindranath was in a very juvenile mood. and  then sang some of his songs most beautifully and brought back the whole feeling of Santiniketan so that I began to feel homesick.
In the next morning one sister of Andrews came to see Rabindranath. Pearson wrote, " it was beautiful to hear the way in which gurudev spoke to her about you and all your devotion to himself and to the School, as well as to humanity."
Rabindranath, too, wrote to him  the same words . He wrote;
" When I am weary and feel a longing to back to my garden of prickly shrubs, it gives me strength to think that the migratory flock of my thoughts have found their nests in hese shores, and with genuine love and wonder these enormously busy people have listened to a voice from the distant East....."       
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