Chapter (অধ্যায়): EPISTLES PAGE-205Page: 205 of 519
disciples, and both are now staying in the Uttarakhanda (the sacred Himalayas). Four of us from here are in the Himalayas now, and with Gangadhar they are five. One brother-disciple named Shivananda came across Gangadhar at Srinagara on the way to holy Kedarnath, and Gangadhar has sent two letters here. During his first year in the Himalayas, he could not secure permission to enter Tibet, but he got it the next year. The Lamas love him much, and he had picked up the Tibetan language. He says the Lamas form ninety per cent of the population, but they mostly practise Tantrika forms of worship. The country is intensely cold-eatables there are scarcely any-only dried meat; and Gangadhar had to travel and live on that food. My health is passable, but the state of mind is terrible!
Yours etc.,
Vivekananda
VII
VIictory to God!
Baghbazar, Calcutta
4th July, 1889
{original in Bengali}
Dear Sir {Pramadadas Mitra},
It pleased me highly to know all the news in your letter yesterday. You have asked me to request Gangadhar to write to you, but I see no chance thereof, for though they are sending us letters, they do not stop anywhere for more than two or three days and therefore do not receive any of ours.
Some relative of my former life1 has purchased a bungalow at Simultala (near Baidynath). The place being credited with a healthy climate, I stayed there for some time. But the summer heat growing excessive, I
1 The life he has renounced.