Yours, whatever may come of it,
K. H.
Letter No. 50 (ML-88) Dated March 11, 1882
The three letters that follow are considered together because of the times and the circumstances under which they were received. All were received at Allahabad during the visit of Col. Olcott and the chela Bhavani Rao (Shankar).
On the day before Sinnett received this letter, he had written to K.H. and had given the letter to Bhavani Rao. The next morning Bhavani Rao found this note under his pillow. He explained that Sinnett's letter had been taken the evening before.
It happened that on the day this was written (March 11), Sinnett had returned home in the evening to find several telegrams awaiting him. These, he said, were all enclosed in the usual way in envelopes securely fastened before being sent out from the telegraph office. The telegrams were all from ordinary people about business matters. However, inside one of the envelopes he found a little folded note from the Mahatma M. "The mere fact that it had been thus transferred by occult methods inside the closed envelope was a phenomenon in itself," he says, but the phenomenon about which the note gave him information was "even more obviously wonderful."
The note made me search in my writing-room for a fragment of a plaster bas-relief that M_____ had just transported instantaneously from Bombay. Instinct took me at once to the place where I felt that it was most likely I should find the thing which had been brought — the drawer of my writing-table exclusively devoted to occult correspondence; and there, accordingly, I found a broken corner from a plaster slab, with M_____' s signature marked upon it. I telegraphed at once to Bombay to ask whether anything special had just happened, and next day received back word that M_____ had smashed a certain plaster portrait and had carried off a piece. In due course of time I received a minute statement from Bombay, attested by the signatures of seven persons in all as regards all essential points. (The Occult World, pp. 164-166).
Briefly, the statement was to the effect that several persons were seated at the dining-table at tea in H.P.B.'s verandah. They all heard a knock, as of something falling and breaking, behind the door of H.P.B.'s writing room, which was unoccupied. This was followed by a still louder noise and all rushed into the writing room. There, just behind the door, they found on the floor a Paris plaster mould of a portrait broken into several pieces. The iron wire loop of the portrait was intact, and not even bent. The pieces of the plaster were spread on the table and it was found that one piece was missing. It was searched for but not found. Shortly afterward, H.P.B. went into the room and a minute or so later showed them a note in the handwriting of the Mahatma M. and with his signature, stating that the missing piece was taken by him to Allahabad and that she should collect and carefully preserve the remaining pieces.
Sinnett goes on to say that the fact that the piece received by him in Allahabad was "veritably the actual piece missing from the cast broken at Bombay" was proved a few days later, "for all remaining pieces at Bombay were carefully packed up and sent to me, and the fractured edges of my fragment fitted exactly into those of the defective corner, so that I was enabled to arrange the pieces altogether again and complete the cast."
After he received this note [Letter No. 50 (ML-88)] through Bhavani Rao, he wrote again the next day to K.H., thinking that he might take additional advantage of the conditions presented by the presence of Olcott and the young man. He gave this letter to Bhavani Rao on the evening of March 13. On the 14th he received a very short note from K.H. saying: "Impossible: no power. Will write thro' Bombay."
Sinnett comments that when, in due time, he received this letter written through Bombay,120 he learned that the limited facilities of the moment had been exhausted and that his suggestions could not be complied with. But the importance of the whole thing, he said, was the fact that he did, after all, exchange letters with K.H. at an interval of a few hours at a time when H.P.B. was at the other side of India.
In the meantime, between the 11th and the 13th of March, Letter No. 51 (ML-120) was received by Mrs. Sinnett. This note indicates that the Mahatma K.H. had sent her a lock of his hair to wear as an amulet. Mrs. Sinnett was not robust, it will be remembered, and for this reason had remained in England for some time after her husband had returned to India.
Some time later, the Mahatma sent a lock of hair to the Sinnetts' son Denny to wear and there is also indication that Sinnett himself had a lock of K.H.' s hair which he wore.
Short Note received at Allahabad during stay of Olcott and Bhavani Rao.
My good friend — it is very easy for us to give phenomenal proofs when we have necessary conditions. For instance — Olcott's magnetism after six years of purification is intensely sympathetic with ours — physically and morally is constantly becoming more and more so. Damodar and Bhavani Rao being congenitally sympathetic their auras help — instead of repelling and impeding phenomenal experiments. After a time you may become so — it depends on yourself. To force phenomena in the presence of difficulties magnetic and other is forbidden, as strictly as for a bank cashier to disburse money which is only entrusted to him. Mr. Hume cannot comprehend this, and therefore is "indignant" that the various tests he has secretly prepared for us have all failed. They demanded a tenfold expenditure of power since he surrounded them with an aura not of the purest — that of mistrust, anger, and anticipated mockery. Even to do this much for you so far from the Headquarters would be impossible but for the magnetisms O. and B.R. have brought with them — and I could do no more.
K. H.
P.S. — Perhaps, tho', I could put down for you to-day's date March the 11th, 1882.
Letter No. 51 (ML-120) Rec. March 1882
See Notes to Letter No. 50.
To Mr. Sinnett's "lady."
Wear the hair enclosed in a cotton tape (and if preferred in a metal armlet) a little lower than your left armpit below the left shoulder. Follow advice that will be given to you by Henry Olcott. It is good and we shall not object. Harbour not ill-feelings even against an enemy and one who has wronged you: for hatred acts like an antidote and may damage the effect of even this hair.
K. H.
Letter No. 52 (ML-144) Rec. Mar. 14, 1882