xii
appeared to me that you have a better soul than I thought." Then I asked him how it was that he had the dream or the vision, and not I. He said: "Probably because I put you on the way," referring to his prescribing the Gayatri Discipline, and he added: "You have just begun to scratch the power." I then asked him to give me some further directions. He said: "We will see next year." To my great misfortune, I never saw him after this. I went away for the hot weather vacation, and he was shortly after taken ill in Madras and died. During his illness, he was treated by a European member of the medical profession, who was considered the ablest medical man then in the city. Dr. Rangappa, who was an Indian doctor, and who also treated him, told me that Subba Row's illness was "pemphigus", brought about by intense thinking.
I remember Subba Row himself telling me that after he took his B.A. degree, which he did with great distinction, being in the first class, and first in the Presidency, his mind had turned to spiritual matters, and for some nine years he never could sleep, and he used to rack his brain night and day over spiritual subjects. He also tried some Hatha Yoga practices. He said that relief came to him one day when an "old man" appeared to him—astrally I take it—and told him: "Do not go that way, but this way." Those were the words, and from that moment he knew what was wanted in his
