SYMPATHY IN EXCELSIS
You have heard many stories of fellow-feeling in men of rank for the lowly. But the following will, perhaps, beat all record.
Our Vidyàsàgar was once walking home to Birsinha in Midnapore from Calcutta where he was Principal of the Sanskrit college. The distance by road could not be less than 40 miles. He had a servant with him who bore on his head his luggage and walked behind him. Vidyàsàgar was a strong man and a very fast walker; indeed, he was a famous walker. He would leave his man with the load a full mile or a half behind him at times and would stop and sit by the roadside till he came up with him. While Vidyàsàgar thus rested, the servant could not; for the occasion which necessitated the master’s presence at home was urgent and he could not afford to lose time on the way by allowing the servant to halt. Yet he could not force the poor man on when at the third or fourth stage of the journey he looked at his fagged condition. So, what he did, you think? He took up the luggage on his own shoulders and bade the man walk behind him unencumbered. The man obeyed very reluctantly and was ill at ease. How could he be otherwise being, as he was, a good servant who understood propriety of things?
