DEFENCE OF

MADAME BLAVATSKY
Volume l.
(Each volume is complete in itself)
Section 1. Madame Blavatsky and the Mahatma Letters.
2. A Note on the Kiddle Incident.
3. The Mahatma Letters and Messrs. Hare.
4. Mahatma K.H. and A. P. Sinnett.
BY
BEATRICE HASTINGS
2/6
THE HASTINGS PRESS,
4, Bedford Row,
Worthing, Sussex,
England.
1937
2
Mrs. Beatrice Hastings is a writer well-known in literary circles, but, having written mostly
anonymously, is unknown to the general public. The quotations below may, therefore, be convenient.
April 14th, 1932: Beatrice Hastings, the cleverest woman writer of her day. Everyman.
1934. (Mr. Victor Neuburg.): Mrs. Hastings, the famous critic, star turn of the New Age when that
paper was by far the best-written in London. Sunday Referee.
J une 1st, 1933. (Londoners Diary.): I can recall only one other Englishwoman who publishes in both
French and English, and that is Mrs. Beatrice Hastings. Evening Standard.
___________________
Obtainable from the Hastings Press; 2/6d., post free.
All orders are payable in advance. Usual percentage to the Trade. Cheques and Orders payable to
Beatrice Hastings.
Volume II. is almost ready for the press and may be subscribed for now. Contents:
I. The Shrine.
II. The Adyar Saucer Phenomenon.
III. The Coulomb Pamphlet.
IV. The Sewn Letter to Professor Smith.
3
PREFACE
In the first place, I am defending a woman of genius. If H. P. Blavatsky had left to the world only the
Nightmare Tales, From the Caves and J ungles of Hindostan and Blue Mountains, the world would
owe her a laurel.
But we have to add to these, hundreds of pages of literary merit scattered throughout the Secret
Doctrine, Isis Unveiled and the Mahatma Letters; and, from her undisputed writings, many and
many a paragraph of wit, beauty, eerie psychology or plain horse sense (rare enough in our race). To pick
out for quotation, as do her enemies, sentences written in one of her tempers or when a nervous wreck
from calumny and misunderstanding, is simply to emphasise the vast volume on the credit side.
As to the teachings, my personal interest is mainly intellectual and speculative. So far as these concern
science and the history of man, they are more than fascinating, for many of them have been confirmed
since H.P.B. died. But, the progress and destiny of my individual monad, if I have one, leaves me
indifferent. I find almost all I accept summed up in Letters X and XXII of the Mahatma Letters; and
this is pure, cold, salty Gautama science, as opposed to the romantic, self-flattering stuff nowadays
circulated as Buddhism with relic-worship and ten-thousand-pound temples and other anti-Buddhic
rubbish thrown in. This scientific philosophy, which confirmed all I had ever really thought, despite
ephemeral enthusiasms, I had discovered several years before coming on the " Mahatma Letters "; and
these cleared away some evolutionary puzzles. The atmosphere of the Letters did not surprise or
confuse me, for, in my youth, I had been a Fellow of the Blavatsky Lodge for about two years, a piece of
luck.
My feeling of the necessity to defend H.P.B. as a deeply-wronged person arose from a casual reading in a
Spiritualist library of the Report of the Society for Psychical Research. I found myself staring at the gaps;
and soon realised that they must be deliberate gaps. As a student, I was indignant to find myself required
to accept Hodgsons mere opinion where I wanted evidence. I procured a few other documents and,
finally, all the first editions of books, reports, pamphlets, for and against, that I could lay hold of; nearly
everything. My scales came down, in many cases, heavily on the side of H.P.B.
In future volumes, I hope to set out these cases. I hope it will not be easy to trip me up on data, but if any
reader finds a slip, I should be most grateful for information. The data are multifarious, and I have only
one poor brain. A world-wide, but inter-working, body of experts is needed! There are data that one
single person can scarcely obtain. For an instance and it is a real one! a date in some old Indian
paper is out of my reach; some article in the early Australian and Continental journals, etc. How often I
have found that an apparently insignificant date or remark has been just the clue I had lacked! To your
desks, O Theosophists! The defence of H.P.B. is no dream.
In this connection, I name Miss Mary Neff, of Adyar, with a documentarians respect and admiration.
(Mrs.) Beatrice Hastings.
4, Bedford Row,
Worthing, Sussex,
England.
Written, August-October, 1936.
Published, April, 1937
4
DEFENCE OF H. P. BLAVATSKY
__________
SECTION I.
__________
H. P. BLAVATSKY AND THE
MAHATMA LETTERS.
Every literary critic is a collector, with the passion of the collector to secure a rare piece that will
honour him among his peers and with the fury of the collector against imitations. Writing of such
imitations in literature, even the urbane Sainte-Beuve exclaimed I detest . . .
He was writing of the fabricated stuff that is circulated among the public as the real thing; he was not
referring to works of merit issued under pseudonyms. He would scarcely have refused to examine The
Tempest on the ground that we are uncertain whether the man called Shakespeare really wrote the play,
or the Mahatma Letters because no Mahatma has come forward to claim them.
Yet, as certainly may be said, the present-day literary world neglects even to examine these Letters and
the works of H. P. Blavatsky mainly because a certain Society for Psychical Research, that, as such, never
was of any account in Literature, once ventured to say that she lied about the method of their production
and signed them by various names. The literary world takes up an absurd position and loses a great deal.
For, there are many rare pieces in the writings attributed to Blavatsky, and, even when it is indubitably
she writing, and even at her worst, there is always the touch of genius. The further one goes with her and
the more one understands what she is talking about, the more surely one is entertained on every page. As
for instruction, this, of course, depends on ones receptivity towards a philosophy which she never
thrust on anyone, and that she treats often with a humour scarcely applied by philosophers before or since.
Many passages are of pure literary water, and I should like to show them in profusion, to quote them for
their own worth. But, for the purposes of this book, I must confine myself to quoting passages that seem to
me to mark a difference between the genius and style that Helena Petrovna undoubtedly possessed and a
genius and style that she did not possess. The quotations will be accompanied by a digressive commentary
on the circumstances under which they were written.
* * *
H.P.B.s earlier letters and articles, published in the American Press, were corrected by Colonel Olcott,
one of the Founders of the Theosophical Society in New York, and others among her friends and
admirers; she almost requisitioned anyone who could help her along. Yet, she had already a truly genial
sense of English idiom, so much more important, this, than having the mere grammar; and, when we come
to the Nightmare Tales, we see inspiration flying over all the barriers and producing a triumph. Her
private letters frequently halt in expression; she rambles and returns, then seems to summon impatience as
a positive aid and, in a few staccato sentences, dashes off a coherent summary of her thoughts. The mould
5
of the personality is unmistakable in all this early work.
An extract from one of her private letters to Professor Corson, professor of Anglo-Saxon and English
Literature at Cornell University, may illustrate her uncorrected style at this period; and it will also indicate
the point on which I shall insist, namely, that she was no born teacher and had nothing of the temperament
necessary for the serene expositional expression of which we find so much in Isis Unveiled and certain
of the Mahatma Letters. The extract is from Some Unpublished Letters of Madame Blavatsky (P.153),
by E. R. Corson, B.S., M.D.
You are acquainted with the Labarum only as many others are. You take it to be a monogram of Christ,
for the books you allude to never thought (or perhaps did not know themselves) that because the shape . . .
happened to resemble Greek letters . . . it was not proof at all that the Labarum had been formed of the
letters belonging to the Greek alphabet. Why should not the Greek alphabet be as likely composed
partially of the most ancient signs and symbols? Such is the case, I assure you. I defy all the scientists of
the world, as well as all the antiquarians, philologists, and all the Champollions, senior and junior, to
prove to me that this symbol does not exist as far back as 16,000 years previous to the birth of Christ.
Contrast this (remembering that H.P.B. was deeply concerned to earn Professor Corsons good opinion
and would have done all she humanly could to interest him) with the following fluid, leisurely second
paragraph of Isis Unveiled (Vol. I. P.1), written about the same time.
A conviction, founded upon seventy thousand years of experience, as they allege, has been entertained by
hermetic philosophers of all periods that matter has in time become, through sin, more gross and dense
than it was at mans first formation; that, at the beginning, the human body was of a half-ethereal nature;
and that, before the fall, mankind communed freely with the now unseen universe. But since that time,
matter has become the formidable barrier between us and the world of spirits. The oldest esoteric
traditions also teach that, before the mystic Adam, many races of human beings lived and died out, each
giving place in its turn to another. Were these precedent types more perfect? Did any of them belong to
the winged race of men mentioned by Plato in the Phaedrus? It is the special province of science to solve
the problem. The caves of France and the relics of the stone age afford a point at which to begin.
One will search H.P.B.s previous writings in vain for anything like this style. Olcott tells us in his
ever-fresh Old Diary Leaves that several invisible personages dictated parts of Isis to H.P.B. And he
says that he came to know by the handwriting which of them was on duty. I think that many passages
indicate the particular hand above; quietly authoritative and never in a hurry:
The recognised laws of physical science account for but a few of the more objective of the so-called
spiritualistic phenomena. While proving the reality of certain visible effects of an unknown force, they
have not thus far enabled scientists to control at will even this portion of the phenomena. The truth is that
the professors have not yet discovered the necessary conditions of their occurrence. They must go as
deeply into the study of the triple nature of man physiological, psychological and divine as did their
predecessors, the magicians, theurgists and thaumaturgists of old.
Isis runs to about 1,200 pages; the Index alone would be an education to most people. H.P.B. began it
during a visit to Professor Corson. On returning, she wrote: I am nailed up to my chair writing all day
like a slave as I did at your place. I have found some precious rare books at Mr. Ditsons, like B. Higgins
Anacalypsis, for instance, and it is very useful to me. And what do you do, and pussy and the apple-trees?
I feel as if I had left a home where I had lived twenty years.
6
Mr. E. R. Corson, who arranged the letters for publication, remarks: My parents had never met such a
person and they could not fathom her. Even my father . . . was non-plussed, and only later realised that he
had housed a wonderful personality.
When I reflect that this personality, this slave chained to her desk, who has afforded me over many years
so many hours of intellectual amusement to say no more than that narrowly escaped being trapped
and sent to the Andaman Islands through the ignorant ferocity of the agent of the S.P.R., I shudder, fifty
years later.
* * *
An industrious bookworm named Emmette Coleman, employed by the S.P.R., once published a volume to
prove that Isis Unveiled is one vast plagiarism. He took no account of the fact that H.P.B. was engaged
precisely in citing authorities to support her in her quest for the thread of occult science stretching from
the most ancient to modern times. She would quote indifferently from an old book or from a New York
newspaper so long as the matter served her purpose. Mr. Coleman found it convenient to brush over her
constant citation of names of authorities. The truth is that there is scarcely a page of the book without a
name; one is whirled from authority to authority and left in no doubt whatever that she is compiling and
means to show that she is not inventing her subjects. She could hardly have cited names more often
without wearying the reader. To know where to stop, as she did, requires literary tact. Mr. Coleman
becomes gravely venomous over her paraphrasings of learned Orientalists, scientists and translators, her
frequent ommission of quotation marks. It is as if I should sulk at her quotations from, and paraphrasings
of, the Bible, Shakespeare, Dickens and others. I know what her sources are, but I never suppose that she
is trying to bamboozle me when she quotes without marks, or works an apt phrase (with wonderful
aptness!) into her own sentences.
Verifying a list of plagiarisms given by Coleman, I found that, out of thirty-five names of authors,
twenty-six were given by H.P.B. in the text of Isis Unveiled. Seeing that her one great concern was to
pile up authorities in her own support, I conclude that she did not know where she had read certain matter,
had perhaps made notes without setting down the author or, perhaps, had simply remembered the passages
and recovered them from the famous subconscious: or, perhaps, read them in the astral light
something we know a good deal more about today than was known fifty years back.
What could be better done with a vast library of scattered information than to assemble the essential in
one book? And when a book is so rich in good writing what complaints of a man who shows himself
such a poor writer, such a gloomy lier-in-wait, should I heed? As a literary artist, I laugh at him. H.P.B.
obtained fairy fortunes for her book. She said that she got them from her Masters. However she got
them, there they are; and you do not get these fortunes unless you are the right person!
* * *
I do not know where to choose from Isis. Mr. G. Baseden Butt, in his Madame Blavatsky, compares
the form of the book with a gigantic rondo. Although the author seems to wander into innumerable issues
and to touch upon an infinitude of subjects, she returns again and again to the principal theme: the reality
of occult knowledge. I will take a passage from Vol. I, P. 284, where the subject is the knowledge of the
ancient theurgists:
The universal ether was not, in their eyes, simply a something stretching, tenantless, through the expanse
7
of heaven; it was a boundless ocean, peopled like our familiar seas with monstrous and minor creatures,
and having in its every molecule the germs of life. Like the finny tribes which swarm in our oceans and
smaller bodies of water, each tribe having its habitat in some spot to which it is curiously adapted, some
friendly and some inimical to man, some pleasant and some frightful to behold, some seeking the refuge of
quiet nooks and land-locked harbours, and some traversing great areas of water, the various races of the
elemental spirits were believed by them to inhabit the different portions of the great ethereal ocean, and to
be exactly adapted to their respective conditions. If we will only bear in mind the fact that the rushing of
planets through space must create as absolute a disturbance in this plastic and attenuated medium as the
passage of a cannon shot does in the air or that of a steamer in the water, and on a cosmic scale, we can
understand that, admitting our premises to be true, certain planetary aspects may produce much more
violent agitation and cause much stronger currents to flow in a given direction than others. With the same
premises conceded, we may also see why, by such various aspects of the stars, shoals of friendly or hostile
elementals might be poured in upon our atmosphere, or some particular portion of it, and make the fact
appreciable by the effects that ensue.
* * *
The rhythm of that sweep of phrases, together with the clarity, will surely arouse the admiration of any
expository writer. To my mind, H.P.B. did not, and could not, have written this and the many similar
passages. She had not the temperament. She expounds always with, as it were, a thump on the desk. Never
to the end will she do otherwise. See her foot-notes to articles published in the early Theosophist and
Lucifer; many of these are not far short of a box on the ear.
* * *
Now passing to the Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett, I shall give a rapid account of the circumstances
surrounding the first letters. We have (so far) no letters from H.P.B. to Sinnett before the first of the
Mahatma Letters for comparison, but I quote a few extracts here and there from those she wrote to him
later.
Madame Blavatsky and Colonel Olcott arrived from New York in Bombay on February 6th, 1879. That
year, Sinnett, then editor of the Pioneer, a Conservative paper, invited them to his house at Allahabad.
He himself had long been interested in psychical research and his first interest in the new Theosophists
was along these lines. The visit was a somewhat stormy success, owing, mainly, to certain peoples
scepticism as to occult science and phenomena. In September, 1880, he invited the two Founders of the
T.S. to his summer residence at Simla. Sinnett begged H.P.B. not to talk Theosophy or do any phenomena
outside their own circle. But she had come there, not to take a fashionable holiday, but just precisely to
talk Theosophy and, as she hoped, to attract the Anglo-Indian world to the Society through phenomena.
No doubt, she took Sinnetts conventional timidity as an affront, not only to herself but to her beloved
Masters. On any excuse, she stamped about all day in a succession of rages. Sinnett was in despair.
However, Mrs. Colonel Gordon, a well-known and hardy Spiritualist from Calcutta was at Simla, and
eager to meet H.P.B., whose fame as a wonder-worker had long since spread around India. Government
officials and their wives called. Dinners were given. Soon, no fashionable dinner was considered complete
without Madame Blavatsky. And the phenomena began. Airy bells rang out, raps were made to sound,
apparently at will, and wherever anyone desired to hear them. Simla murmured that she was helped by the
*
I hope that the Colemans who know my sources will not accuse me of literary theft!
8
Devil, but came to see and hear.
*
Among the visitors was Major Henderson, Chief of Police of all India. He made much of H.P.B. Although,
or because, he had the duty of observing her as a person suspect to Government, he made one of a picnic-
party on October 3rd. At this picnic, some startling phenomena took place, and the Major was impressed.
Someone suggested that he should show his faith by joining the Theosophical Society. He replied that, if
Madame would produce him a diploma on the spot, he would join. In a few moments, she told him that he
would find one under a bush, signed, and tied with many yards of blue string. He found it. Next day, he
sent H.P.B. a kind of ultimatum to the effect that, unless she would repeat the phenomenon in another
place and under test conditions, he should regard the whole thing as humbug. H.P.B. swore terribly,
refused. And now she had made an enemy of an all-powerful man.
When the case for and against H.P.B. is to be considered, Major Henderson must never be left out of
account. The persons who write against her make very little, when any, account of him. They tell us,
mostly with a wretched kind of superciliousness, that she had a host of confederates, that she corrupted
postal employees all over India, that she had only to send wires here and there to have her orders carried
out. But, Major Henderson was on the spot, with spies in every village (and some continually on H.P.B.s
tracks), with access to the files of every post-office, with an intense desire to confound her; and he never
discovered either confederates or incriminating communications.
* * *
An account of a phenomenon having appeared in the Pioneer, other newspapers raised a hue and cry of
fraud. H.P.B. lived in a maelstrm of indignation, was rude to people, lost friends; and burst out again
at every slight. The Sinnetts, and other people who knew her in day-to-day intimacy, remained loyal; but
her nerves whirled her into ill-health and frightful headaches.
One day, about October 15th, Sinnett asked her if she could send a letter from him to one of the Mahatmas
whom H.P.B. called her Masters. He wrote, suggesting that the world should be convinced once and for
all by a grand phenomenon, namely the apport to Simla from London of a copy of the Times on the day
of publication. On October 18th, he received through H.P.B. a reply signed by the Mahatma Koot Hoomi.
One is struck immediately by the difference in fundamental rhythm from the temperament of H.P.B.
Sinnetts impression as a professional man of letters, that here was a different hand, holds good for me.
Whoever wrote, or dictated, the first paragraph of the Mahatma Letters, quoted below, had cool, taut
nerves, authority and self-possession, decision and indifference to criticism such as we are not accustomed
to from Madame Blavatsky; her rhythm being that of the haughty fighter, frequently beaten but
immediately often, too soon! returning to the battle. At this very moment, after doing some
challenged phenomenon, her reply was to swear and perform another under even more suspect conditions!
We hear how deeply she annoyed her Masters by this futile recklessness. I feel that she was physically
incapable of penning the extract below; that I have to do with a totally new bodily organism:
Precisely because the test of the London newspaper would close the mouths of the skeptics it is
unthinkable. See it in what light you will the world is yet in its first stage of disenthralment, hence
unprepared. Very true, we work by natural, not supernatural, means and laws. But, as on the one hand,
9
Science would find itself unable (in its present state) to account for the wonders given in its name, and on
the other the ignorant masses would still be left to view the phenomenon in the light of a miracle;
everyone who would thus be made a witness would be thrown off his balance and the results would be
deplorable. Believe me, it would be so especially for yourself, who originated the idea, and the devoted
woman who so foolishly rushes into the wide open door leading to notoriety. This door, though opened by
so friendly a hand as yours, would prove very soon a trap, and a fatal one indeed for her. And such is
surely not your object.
* * *
What can we think of the adversaries of H.P.B. who quote the above and omit the last three sentences?
And I have yet to read one who does not omit them. There is an excellent reason, an excellently bad
reason: they make too big a hole in the charge of forgery.
The prophecy contained in these sentences came true enough! Two years later, Sinnett was dismissed
from the Pioneer, and four years later, H.P.B., whose life had long been made almost unbearable by
constant accusations of fraud, barely escaped the trap laid to arrest her. Immediately arises the question
as to why the Mahatmas allowed the phenomena to be made public at all. I do not know! But, we can
gather that the Chiefs, the Masters of H.P.B.s Masters, soon considered that the publicity had gone far
beyond what they had sanctioned and, further that H.P.B. was no marionette worked by a wire, but had
reached a degree of pupilship where she might do a good deal as she pleased providing she was prepared
to take the consequences.
* * *
The newspapers grew ever louder and ever more virulent in attack. H.P.B. left Simla in a state of nerves
and heartbreak, running for a break-down.
We hear from the Mahatma K.H. that the Chiefs were deeply incensed at the wild indiscretions at
Simla; but he did not abandon her in the dangerous path she had chosen. He gave Sinnett a proof of her
genuineness. On October 27th, H.P.B. being then at Amritsar and daily surrounded by new crowds,
received from Sinnett a letter to be sent on to K.H. The letter arrived, according to the post-mark, at 2 p.m.
Sinnett, at Allahabad, received a wired reply from J helum, timed at 4 p.m. J helum was then eight hours
by train from Amritsar. K.H. told Sinnett to apply to see the original of the telegram. He found that it was
in the handwriting of K.H.
No-one has ever been able to make anything of this. The S.P.R. was driven to suggest that the post-mark
was arranged for H.P.B. by the postal officials, and then, that she must have wired the right reply to a
confederate at J helum who re-wired to Sinnett. (S.P.R. Proceedings, December 1885. Hodgsons Report.
P. 272). The story made a sensation at Allahabad and Simla . . . and, no doubt, Major Henderson had a
glance at the post-office files.
Amazing H.P.B.! Nine days after forging the first long letter in a new style and handwriting, she can find a
confederate at J helum to reproduce that writing. And there is more, much more. The Letters continue;
these letters in the new solid rhythm, and that introduce us with careless familiarity to a world of which
we know nothing, a world of men living apart and yet in touch with the life of India and the world in
general.
10
If all this were a theatre, with actors, repertory and scenery invented by H. P. Blavatsky what a
consummate genius! Nothing comparable was ever known in literary history. The finest play ever written
is but a play, with the climax foreseen and actors given their parts. H.P.B. would have had to make her
play at every step, remembering every past letter, word, incident, reference, against a second set of actors
over whose rles she had no control and some of whom were desperately suspicious of her. There are
nearly five hundred pages of published Mahatma Letters. They continued over years and through an
heterogyny of persons, place, time and incident such that merely to read of it all bewilders one for long
months of study. And the slips of memory I had nearly said that there are none; they are so few as to be
almost negligible. And there is this significant fact : the letters are composed so that, without having the
other side of the correspondence, (this seems, so far, unfindable), we can, ultimately, get a clear view of
the whole!
* * *
She is almost breaking down with illness and worry; but the style of the Letters never falters. The play
goes on with never a hitch.
Colonel Olcott, whom the hounders of H.P.B. will need to bring in as a co-fraud despairing, otherwise,
of explaining certain phenomena Olcott acts with singular independence. He has sent to Bombay, for
circulation among members of the Theosophical Society there, a letter describing the incidents of the
Simla picnic-party, mentioning all the names. A copy of this letter has been stolen and sold to a Bombay
paper. In due course, the paper arrives in the north, and the party, with the Major, are furious. The affair
reduces H.P.B., now down in the Plains, to a rag. Already suffering tortures from her body, hardly able to
breathe in the appalling heat and dust, and now with angry and insulting letters arriving, she sits down
calmly to carry on the play and pens the following epistle in the K.H. handwriting. Or, so her enemies
wish us to believe. The letter is dated Oct. 29th, two days after the J helum telegram. (M.L. P.11).
. . . The affair has taken an impulse, which, if not well guided, might beget very evil issues. Recall to
mind the avalanches of your admired Alps, that you have often thought about, and remember that, at first,
their mass is small and their momentum little. A trite comparison you may say, but I cannot think of a
better illustration when viewing the gradual aggregation of trifling events growing into a menacing destiny
for the Theos. Soc. It came upon me forcibly the other day as I was coming down the defiles of Kouenlun
Karakorum you call them and saw an avalanche tumble. I had gone personally to submit to our
Chief Mr. Humes important offer [to start an Anglo-Indian Branch], and was crossing over to Ladak on
my way home. What other speculations might have followed, I cannot say. But just as I was taking
advantage of the awful stillness which usually follows such a cataclysm, to get a clearer view of the
present situation and the disposition of the mystics at Simla, I was rudely recalled to my senses. A
familiar voice, as shrill as the one attributed to Saraswatis peacocks, which, if we may credit tradition,
frightened off the King of the Nagas shouted along the currents, Olcott has raised the very devil
again! . . . the Englishmen are going crazy. Koot Hoomi, come quicker and help me! and in her
excitement forgot she was speaking English. I must say, that the old ladys telegrams do strike one like
stones from a catapult.
What could I do but come? Argument through space with one who was in cold despair and in a state of
moral chaos was useless. So I determined to emerge from the seclusion of many years and spend some
time with her to comfort her as well as I could. But our friend is not one to cause her mind to reflect the
philosophical resignation of Marcus Aurelius. The fates never wrote that she could say: It is a royal thing,
when one is doing good, to hear evil spoken of himself.
11
* * *
Olcotts diary records that, a few days before, on the 26th, he and H.P.B. saw the Mahatma in the Golden
Temple and that he gave them each a rose. (This is all important in considering the Rattan Chand Bary
incident.)
Someone sent the J helum telegram. Someone gave the rose. Why a confederate? Why not one of the
Mahatmic Fraternity? Mahatmas exist, or, India has bamboozled, not English sahibs, but itself, for untold
generations. True, no-one seems able to produce a Mahatma, or even a Chela, a disciple, for examination
on demand. They will not come!
It is, also, alas! certain that the Mahatmas of the Letters will obey an order from the Chiefs and set to
work to sweep away all vestiges of their existence; this, when their failure becomes evident to bring
about an Anglo-Indian understanding as a prelude to a world-movement towards Universal Brotherhood.
(Some may think that they did not entirely fail; at any rate, this ideal, feebly realised by the League of
Nations, came into popular circulation through the Theosophical Society.)
Let Sinnett prize these first Letters! Soon, very soon, we shall find him timidly neglecting the practical
object and asking ever more anxiously for Information, information that he can publish to the intellectual
world, asking for details of the Cosmic Scheme, asking for the moon. K.H. will be willing for almost any
sacrifice, sacrifice beyond what is allowed by this far-sighted, unsentimental Lodge; will become the
wonder of others of the Fraternity who hear of the antics of the English aspirants, Sinnett and Hume (son
of J oseph Hume and, himself, later, Father of the Indian National Congress.) Both Sinnett and Hume
were in a hurry for adeptship and eager to show the adepts how all could be done more easily. K.H. will
hear himself dubbed a dzing-dzing visionary, but he will persist even with the more obstreperous of the
two pupils until the Chief, seeing him ready to lay aside his own advancement, will step in and he will be
sent to bed for one of the periods of physical oblivion that even an adept must observe if he is not to
lose his powers.
We may, thereafter, be reasonably certain when the Mahatma is personally dictating, but we shall be sure
frequently that he is not. That masterly rhythm will become rarer. Never to the end will it disappear
altogether; indeed some of the finest passages will come late. H.P.B. or another chela may write, as she
tells us from a few notes, a few suggestions given for elaboration; but, however deliberately doubtful the
hand from Tibet may be allowed to become for the superficial reader, its shadow will remain plain enough
for the student.
* * *
One would almost break under the task of all the volumes that would need to be written to present the full
story of the Theosophical Society from 1875 to 1891, when H.P.B. died; and, of course, I mean only the
exoteric story. Such a multitude of personalities, such a tangle of impinging psychologies, each needing to
be known and understood before we can begin even dimly to discern why the Mahatmas permitted or
hindered this or that development. The wild indiscretions that so deeply incensed the Hobilghan in the
early days at Simla seem harmless compared with the tragic follies of later times. And we wonder why the
Masters do nothing to check them. We see H.P.B. apparently abandoned to her own devices, heading for
precipice after precipice; and then, when all seems lost, we see her snatched away, as she was snatched
from the grip closing around her at Adyar in that dreadful spring of 1885, when the gates of the prison
were gaping for her. She is not abandoned. She sails away safely, finds new friends, makes more blunders
12
blunders that convince the Western world finally that Mahatmas are all moonshine makes new and
appalling enemies, escapes them all and lives to write a colossal work of extraordinary merit, among a
host of persons of impeccable reputation, and some of great learning, who vie with each other to honour
her, and to testify for her after her death.
The coming of the Countess Wachtmeister to the lonely exile of Wrzburg, in Dec. 1885, is, to my
mind, one of the most thrilling episodes in literary story. But for this angel, it may be doubted whether the
Secret Doctrine could ever have seen the light. A few weeks after she shone in, the cruel Report of the
Society for Psychical Research fell on H.P.B. One shrinks from imagining the agony of H.P.B. had she
been alone. Why is the book written by the Countess, Reminiscences of H. P. Blavatsky, not in the
hands of every Theosophist?
* * *
Meanwhile, we return to Lahore, in November, 1880.
The fury of public attack grew ever more intense and, suddenly, H.P.B. broke physically under it and lay
with a raging fever. The Colonel had left on a lecturing tour in the Plains, and she was alone with her
servant, the devoted Bahula, for a nurse! A typhoidic symptom aggravated the nervous state.
And, all the while, she never forgot the play! Olcott, who had been summoned, departed to fill his
engagements while she was still forbidden by the doctor to travel. In this state, she received a copy of the
Bombay Gazette, quoting a correspondent of the Calcutta Englishman they were all after her
who tried to excite the public by hinting that she had published a series of letters, From the Caves and
J ungles of Hindostan, in the Anti-English newspaper, the Moscow Gazette. She wrote to Sinnett about
this and concluded with some querulous and hardly coherent complaints against the Mahatma K.H. Then,
bracing up, this wonderful woman forged the following post-script (Letters from H. P. Blavatsky to A.
P. Sinnett. P.7.):
Spirit is strong, but flesh is weak; so weak sometimes that it even overpowers the strong spirit which
knows all truth. And now, having almost shaken off its control, this poor body raves. Since even I am not
above suspicion in her sight, you can hardly be too indulgent with her or use too many precautions until
this dangerous nervous crisis is passed. It was brought on by a series of unmerited insults (which, of
course, such men as you and Colonel Olcott would not even have noticed, but which none the less put her
to the torture) and can only be cured by rest and peace of mind. If you are ever to learn any lesson about
man's duality and the possibility through occult science, of awakening from its dormant state to an
independent existence the invisible but real I am, seize this chance. Observe and learn. It is cases like this
which puzzle the biologist and physiologist. But, as soon as one learns the duality, all becomes clear. I am
sorry to say that I can now only act through her on very rare occasions and under the greatest precautions.
Mr. Hume's letter to her, a letter full of suspicion and benevolent insult proved the one drop too
much. Her Punjaub fever once the typhoid symptom removed is no worse in itself than many a
European has passed through; while I may tell you, now that the crisis is over, her reason as well as her
life were in peril on Saturday night.
And she signed Koot Hoomi. And the caligraphy is that of K.H. Aching from head to foot, with cold
and hot nervous streams pouring over her, her hand does not tremble. She reproduces the famous script to
the last pothook counted by the experts of the S.P.R. So they wish us to believe!
13
However, the date of the above post-script places it in the period of the precipitation of writing direct on
to a blank sheet. If, as is likely, the Mahatma used this method, it does away with the phenomenon of the
handwriting in this case, although, later on, we shall find H.P.B., when again driven half mad with slander
and infected blood, a mass of boils and ulcers, forging letters of ten to forty pages, in quite another
script and in a quite different literary style. And what a style! There are several gems in Letter XXIX. One
scarcely knows which to choose as the more surprising, the script or the style! I do not know whether the
S.P.R. has grown up to the point of accepting the fact of Precipitation; in 1884, it had only one
explanation for the phenomenon, forgery. It is of no use to argue about such things with people still in the
backwoods of this fast-advancing Psycho-morphic Age; if such people will not take the statements of
those who have seen, done and know, they must leave them and die in their ignorance.
* * *
Neither the Mahatma Letters nor those of H.P.B. to Sinnett are published in correct chronological order
(to the confusion of such detractors in a hurry as Messrs. Hare, whose recent book, that I shall notice later,
makes them the laughing-stock of every student). In addition, both she and Sinnett are utterly careless
about dates. Her first letter to Sinnett is on P.6 (except for a note in French on P.4). She dates it Nov. 2,
1880; the right date is the 22nd. She was recovering from the fever. (This is the letter to which K.H. added
the above post-script):
Dear Boss, I am afraid I begin a task above my strength. But if I do not peg out, I am determined to fight
my way through and never leave one chance to my enemies to bother me. This is why I begged you to
publish a few words in reply to a stupid and vile insinuation [that she was spying for Russia].
On Dec. 1st, she and Olcott went on a ten days visit to the Sinnetts at Allahabad. On the 10th, the famous
plagiarised Kiddle Letter was produced; after which, Precipitation was stopped by orders from the
Chief. This letter is always seized on by the adversary as a capital proof of humbug and impudence.
Perhaps it may afford proof of another sort. It shall have a short section to itself.
* * *
It must not be supposed that Madame Blavatsky, at this period, had nothing to do but invent the style and
forge the script of the Mahatma Letters; be the lioness of all the social gatherings, attend lectures, talk
to all and everyone about Theosophy and the Society; sleep, bath, dress and eat; correspond with a
hundred people all over India, write for the Theosophist, read, and frequently comment on, articles sent
in; keep in touch with her Russian editors and run an eye over the world's news and reviews; be ill;
organise fraudulent phenomena, such as having diplomas buried under bushes miles outside Simla;
hypnotise everybody everywhere to think, say and do just what she needed for the perpetration of her
frauds; handle the network of confederates she had, the person who wrote the J helum telegram and the
Amritsar postal employees who must have tampered with the post-mark, the god-like Hindu who
bamboozled the Colonel with a rose in the Golden Temple and the man in white who must have stuck
notes in trees; unpick a heavy old velvet and worsted cushion (and ensure that it should not be missed and
asked for at any moment), unpick the inner lining, stick in a note and a brooch and sew the cushion up
again, with new thread exactly the same as the old, without leaving a trace (velvet!); have endless
discussions with Hume and other sceptics; travel, attend new Branch inaugurations, talk to new members;
pass hours and whole days in despair and rage under a hurricane of slander, explain to friends and reply to
enemies all around the country; fall desperately ill and, barely convalescent, gather up unerringly all the
threads of her huge conspiracy . . .
14
She had, also, to send telegrams to Madame Coulomb, the petty tigress whose claws proved long enough,
however, to tear her benefactress sufficiently after a Committee of the Society refused to be blackmailed,
in April, 1884.
Madame Coulomb, housekeeper at Headquarters, had the duty, so she said, of placing halves of cigarettes
in spots in Bombay, according to instructions sent by H.P.B. in telegrams in code. And H.P.B. had to keep
all this in mind and send the wires, infallibly timed. The Coulombs sold to the editor of the Christian
College Magazine a letter allegedly from H.P.B. that proved to his satisfaction and that of the S.P.R. that
she had been sending telegrams from Simla:
Programme entirely changed. We go to Amritsar and Lahore on the 21st, and I can send you no more
telegrams.
Italics, too, as though she guessed that, one day, Madame Coulomb and compeers would need some
particular emphasis on these words!
But the Coulombs could produce no telegrams, in code or not. Madame Coulomb laid up in secret every
scrap of a letter from H.P.B., but seems to have destroyed the telegrams that would have clinched her
case!
There were no telegrams! The woman might safely forge letters in H.P.B.s writing, or near enough to suit
the Missionaries and the S.P.R. but she could not forge telegrams from Simla. In Sinnetts brilliantly
written defence of H.P.B., The Occult World Phenomena, published in 1886, and ignored by ninety-nine
out of a hundred modern Theosophists, he says: I have been told that the Committee desire to repudiate
responsibility for the Report as to its details. If they began to edit it, they would very likely be puzzled to
know where they should stop. They elected a course, therefore, which bade fair to get the Theosophical
Society blackened as much as possible, while, by professing to shirk the responsibility it was their duty to
bear, they have tried to prevent any of Mr. Hodgsons black coming off on their own fingers.
To me, fifty years afterwards, and with access to all the documents, the Report appears to belong to the
reports of opra-bouffe. No wonder that the S.P.R. has never attempted a revision!
* * *
Pass to J uly, 1883. Sinnett had lost his post on the Pioneer, gone to London and was revivifying the
Theosophical Society there. H.P.B. was at Ootacamund, in the Nilgherri Hills, staying with General
Morgan, and living once again much the kind of crowded life as during her first visit to Simla. The
Society had won through all attacks and was at the apex of popularity in India and in Anglo-Indian
society.
During the Ooty visit, the incident known as the Adyar saucer phenomenon took place. This
phenomenon, with which I shall deal at length in a later section (in Vol. 2.) composed one of the most
notorious charges of fraud. I refer to it here because the planning of this fraud was alleged to have
drawn fatally compromising letters from H.P.B. to the Coulombs. According to the Coulombs, a saucer
was to be made to fall and break from the Shrine (cupboard, where people put in communications for the
Masters and from which they received replies) in the presence of someone, and a similar saucer was to be
thrust through a hole at the back so as to give the impression that the first had been mended instantly by
occult power.
15
Provided the thing takes place in the presence of respectable persons besides our own familiar muffs, I
beg you to do it at the first opportunity.
Another letter: Try if you think it is going to be a success to have a larger audience than our domestic
imbeciles only. It is well worth the trouble, for the Adyar saucer might become historical like the Simla
cup [that was found embedded in the roots of a tree].
Again: Chers Marquis et Marquise . . . beg K.H., whom you see every day . . . to keep up the honour of
the family. (Coulomb was French and was nicknamed the Marquis by H.P.B. K.H. was supposed to
mean Coulomb himself!)
Now, I quote a passage from a Letter signed K.H. that was sent to Sinnett at this time, summer 1883, a
few weeks before : (M.L. P. 343.). Imagine, if you can, this exposition of transcendental metaphysics
coming through the agency of a vulgar cheat, let alone through her own brain!
Avalokitesvara implies the seventh Universal Principle, as the object perceived by the Universal Buddhi,
mind or Intelligence, which is the synthetic aggregation of all the Dhyan Chohans, as of all other
intelligences whether great or small, that ever were, are, or will be. Nor is it the Spirit of Buddhas present
in the Church [Rhys Davids], but the Omnipresent Universal Spirit in the temple of Nature in one
case; and the seventh Principle the Atman in the temple, man in the other. Mr. Rhys Davids might
have remembered the (to him) familiar simile made by the Christian adept; the Kabalistic Paul; Know ye
not that ye are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you? and thus have avoided to
have made a mess of the name. Though, as a grammarian he detected the use of the past particle passive,
yet he shows himself far from an inspired Panini in overlooking the true cause and saving his grammar by
raising the hue and cry against metaphysics. And yet, he quotes Beals Catena as his authority for the
invention when, in truth, this work is perhaps the only one in English that gives an approximately correct
explanation of the word . . . Self-manifested How? it is asked. Speech, or Vch, was regarded as the
Son or the manifestation of the Eternal Self, and was adored under the name of Avalokitesvara, the
manifested God. [Beal.]. This shows as clearly as can be that Avalokitesvara is both the unmanifested
Father and the manifested Son, the latter proceeding from, and identical with, the other; namely, the
Parabraham and J ivatman, the Universal and the individualised seventh Principle the Passive and the
Active, the latter, the Word, Logos, the Verb. Call it by whatever name, only let these unfortunate,
deluded Christians [Kingsford group] know that the real Christ of every Christian is the Vch, the
mystical Voice, while the man J eshu was but a mortal like any of us, an adept more by his inherent
purity and ignorance of real Evil than by what he had learned with his initiated Rabbis and the already fast
degenerating Egyptian hierophants and priests. A great mistake is also made by Beal, who says: This
name, Avalokitesvara, in Chinese took the form of Kwan-Shai Yin, and the divinity worshipped under that
name was generally regarded as a female. Kwan-Shai-Yin or the universally manifested Voice is
active male; and must not he confounded with Kwan-Yin, or Buddhi, the Spiritual Soul and the vehicle
of its Lord. It is Kwan-Yin that is the female Principle or the manifested Passive, manifesting itself to
every creature in the Universe, in order to deliver all men from the consequences of sin as rendered by
Beal, this once quite correctly, while Kwan-Shai-Yin, the Son identical with his Father, is the absolutely
activity hence having no direct relations with objects of sense is Passivity.
What a common ruse it is of your Aristoteleans! with the sleuth-hounds persistence they track an idea to
the very verge of the impassable chasm; and then, brought to bay, leave the metaphysicians to take up the
trail if they can, or let it be lost. It is but natural that a Christian theologian, a missionary, should act upon
this line, since as easily perceived in the little I gave out just now a too correct rendering of our
16
Avalokitesvara and Kwan-Shai-Yin might have very disastrous effects. It would simply amount to
showing Christendom the true and undeniable origin of the awful and incomprehensible mysteries of its
Trinity, Transubstantiation, Immaculate Conception, as also, whence their ideas of the Father, Son,
Spiritus and Mother . . . But why should an atheist and materialist like Mr. Rhys Davids so avoid the
correct rendering of our dogmas even when he happens to understand them, which does not happen
every day is something surpassingly curious.
* * *
Mahatma K.H. once remarked to Hume that human nature is unfathomable. It is possible, therefore, that
H.P.B. gave Madame Coulomb the conspiratorial letters to put in her pocket. It is possible that H.P.B.
wrote the passage above signed K.H. But, to admit, as some people would have us, both, is to admit
that we have reached the very bottom of all the fathoms ever heard of and need a few more. (I consider
that the Master Hilarion wrote the whole of this letter, as, also, other passages in M.L.)
After over seven years study of the Mahatma Letters, I have concluded that H.P.B. did not, and could not,
produce the style of the Mahatmas.
On the authority of the late Lama Kazi-Dawa Sam Dup, Lecturer on Tibetan at Calcutta and, as Dr. Evans
Wentz tells us, Initiate of the learned Kargyutpa Order, we learn that the writings of H.P.B. prove
knowledge of the higher Lamaistic teachings. As none but an Initiate in these teachings could say and
he would not which passages were meant by Sam Dup, there is no room for speculation as to whether
such passages were undoubtedly written by H.P.B. herself. For anyone not initiated to pry on this ground
would be to risk taking some blind sparkling, or solemn verbiage for a teaching. We need only
reflect that no high Initiate would co-operate with and use as agent a woman engaged in fraud. Thus,
Sam Dups testimony clears H.P.B.
If we suppose that she herself was capable of writing on the higher Lamaistic teachings, the case is
equally favourable to her. Think what is implied!
These teachings are only given after the chela, or disciple, has passed through tremendous tests of
morality; not only copy-book-maxim morality, but one for giants. The intuition, active faculty, and not the
conscience, passive, and purely mechanical in most people, is examined in the candidate. Until he can
depend on himself, he can depend on no-one around him; gins and snares, illusions and temptations and
betrayals are his lot. We see, in one of the most bewildering of the Mahatma Letters (P.296) that
Mahatma K.H. (or a chela proxy) infringed the rules by inviting Mahatma Morya (or his proxy) to behave
as if M. were incapable of disloyalty, and that M. promptly let him down and betrayed him into a
dreadful mess. In Nature, there are two kinds of Adepts, one kind engaged in liberating, and the other in
enslaving, mankind. And neither is to be known by his face! Wherefore, the chela is put through a terrible
mill. That H.P.B. had been through this mill, or as far as a woman can go through, is clear in a hundred
places. When? I judge one period to have been from 1851 to 1854. I hope one day to develop this theory.
Her emotionalism unfitted her to become a true adept, as K.H. remarks (P.314), and when she was sent
out into the world alone, she made many a mistake and suffered more than one lapse and subsequent
transitional period.
The higher Lamaistic teachings, however, would not endow H.P.B. with a style outside the scope of her
organism. There is haste and impatience in her expository work; something disorderly; and when she
writes to Sinnett, she can rarely control the testy humour of the advanced student who realises that the
17
plodding junior will never have enough of the proper special wits to jump with. In her most
complimentary mood, she cannot teach without the relief of humour.
From Wrzburg, Oct. 1885 (Letters from H.P.B. to A.P.S. P. 248.), she wrote to Sinnett:
Honoured Sir and Confederate,
Yesterday, Franz Gebhard delighted me with his arrival and rejoiced my ears with the following quotation
from a letter, that you may have heard already.
Besides the block of Humanity to which we belong passing around the chain of planets as correctly
described in E.B. [Esoteric Buddhism by Sinnett] there are six other similar blocks simultaneously
evolving on other parts of the chain.
To this I listened in silent dismay, and would have remained dumb on the subject for ever, had not
Masters faraway tones struck me like a box on the ear . . . and saying Now dont you let Sinnett go off
again on the wrong track. Explain. J ust as though I had led you deliberately on to wrong tracks and not
your own Madame Barbe Bleues vile curiosity! Easy to say explain. I wish He would Himself; for if I
do, and you do not understand me or which is as likely I shall not be able to explain so that you
should understand, I shall be responsible for it and the only one blamed as usual. However listen, and you
may perhaps realise also what led even Mohini off the right mechanical track and made him write the
unutterable flapdoodle he has in Man from the simply mechanical-cosmos-arrangement standpoint and
tolerably correct one, if understood as applying to the simultaneous evolution of the six races you are
talking about in a Socrates-like way, with your DAIMON whispering it in your ear. For I dont see how
you could have got the idea in any other way.
We are very far here from the strong, serene hand of the passage signed K. H., and scores of similar
passages throughout the Letters.
* * *
It is not at all easy to find in the undoubted writings of H.P.B. any expositional matter that will really
compare for fine style with the passages I have quoted. She always argues, asserts, and gives a bang. The
best specimens would be such as deal with extremely intricate subjects, symbolistic and kabbalistic
questions, and these are not suitable for reproduction here. I select an extract from a letter she wrote to the
London Spiritualist, August, 1881, where she is certainly trying to be both clear and persuasive:
The great science, called by the vulgar, magic, and by its Eastern proficients, Gupta-Vidya, embracing
as it does each and every science, since it is the acme of Knowledge, and constitutes the perfection of
philosophy, is universal; hence, as very truly remarked, cannot be confined to one particular nation or
geographical locality. But, as Truth is one, the method for the attainment of its highest proficiency must
necessarily be also one. It cannot be subdivided, for, once reduced to parts, each of them left to itself, will
like rays of light, diverge from, instead of converging to, its centre, the ultimate goal of knowledge; and
these parts can re-become the whole only by collecting them together again, or each fraction will remain
but a fraction. This truism, which may be termed elementary mathematics for little boys, has to be recalled
in order to refresh the memory of such adepts as are too apt to forget that Christian Kabbalism is but a
fraction of Universal occult science. And, if they believe that they have nothing more to learn, then the
less they turn to Eastern adepts for information, the better and less trouble for both. There is but one
royal road to Divine Magic; neglect and abandon it to devote yourself specially to one of the paths
18
diverging from it, and like a lonely wanderer, you find yourself lost in an inextricable labyrinth. Magic, I
suppose, existed milleniums before the Christian era; and, if so, are we to think then, with our too learned
friends, that it was all Black Magic, practised by the old firm of Devil and Co.?
* * *
And here is a passage (Theosophist, Dec. 1881) almost, if not quite, free from anything like a bang,
although the context arouses a doubt whether the matter were not suggested to her: The subject is Is
creation possible for Man?
But we must have a clear understanding as to what is meant by creation. Probably the common idea on
the subject is that when the world was created, the creator accorded himself or was somehow accorded a
dispensation from the rule ex nihilo nihil fit and actually made the world out of nothing if that is the
idea of creation to be dealt with now, the reply of the philosophers would be not merely that such creation
is impossible to man but that it is impossible to gods or God; in short absolutely impossible. But a step in
the direction of a philosophical conception is accomplished when people say the world was created (we
say fashioned) out of Chaos. Perhaps they have no very clear idea of what they mean by Chaos, but it is a
better word to use in this case than nothing. For suppose we endeavour to conceive chaos as the matter
of the universe in an unmanifested state, it will be seen at once that, although such matter is perfectly
inappreciable to ordinary human senses, and to that extent equivalent to nothing, creation from such
materials is not the production of something which did not exist before, but a change of state imposed
upon a portion of universal matter which, in its previous state, was invisible, intangible and imponderable,
but not on that account non-existent. Theosophist-Occultists do not, however, use the word creation at
all, but replace it by that of Evolution.
* * *
I think that that is the best H.P.B. can do with an expositional pen; and there is no style in it; there is
nothing to compare with the masterly ease of that other pen that can guide a subject through a paragraph
of forty lines, with many branchings, and never the slightest loss of clarity or any deviation of rhythm. She
had her own magnificent and enthralling genius for narrative and description, her own astonishing genius
for wit and the broadest humour but this genius she had not.
* * *
Incidentally, I am always at a loss to know exactly what may be meant by the word divine in a
philosophy where there is no room for God or gods. It is not quite a case of Whats in a name?, as
may he the case for the use of the word theosophy, a chance suggestion by Mr. Charles Sotheran at the
foundation of the Society, a title that perhaps fitted it better then than later, in India, when the Masters
definitely stated the main object to be Universal Brotherhood. Certainly, we are short of metaphysical
words in English, but surely a better translation of Gupta-Vidya can be found than Divine Magic!
* * *
I close this section with a quotation from a letter signed by the Master M. (M.L. P.252.) It is full of the
images in the Homeric style simple that distinguish the pen of this Master, and that I shall gather in a
later volume.
19
There was a time when, from sea to sea, from the mountains and deserts of the north to the grand woods
and downs of Ceylon, there was but one faith, one rallying-cry to save humanity from the miseries of
ignorance in the name of Him who first taught the solidarity of all men. How is it now? Where is the
grandeur of our people and of the one Truth? These, you may say, are beautiful visions which once were
realities on earth, but had flitted away like the light of a summers evening. Yes; and now we are in the
midst of a conflicting people, of an obstinate, ignorant people, seeking to know the truth yet not able to
find it, for each seeks it only for his own private benefit and gratification, without giving one thought to
others. Will you, or rather, they, never see the true meaning of that great wreck of desolation which has
come to our land and threatens all lands yours, first of all? It is selfishness and exclusiveness that killed
ours, and it is selfishness and exclusiveness that will kill yours which has, in addition, some other
defects I will not name. The world has clouded the light of true knowledge, and selfishness will not allow
its resurrection, for it excludes and will not recognise the whole fellowship of all those who were born
under the same immutable natural law.
* * *
What collector would not be glad to have found that?
20
SECTION 2.
A NOTE ON THE KIDDLE LETTER.
(M.L. P. 22)
There is something touching in the popular horror of literary plagiarism, showing that the old respect for
genius dies hard even in this age of the snippet-mind. Men of genius, however, have always made
somewhat light of plagiarism. In the sphere of general ideas, plagiarism is out of court altogether, for (to
plagiarise) there is nothing new under the sun. Expression of these ideas by a feeble writer is of no
account in the maintenance of their sum; the collectors, the true critics, do not preserve such
expressions, that perish like flies of a day.
Mr. Kiddle, an American Spiritualist lecturer, certainly owes what immortality he may claim to the
incident that Mahatma K.H. noticed his oratorial effort and, as the adversaries declare, dished it up to
Sinnett without quotation marks and with the intention to pass it off as his own creation.
In discussing this Kiddle incident, always a great favourite with the small literary enemy, these critics
begin at the wrong end; serviceably, of course, to themselves. The proper presentation of the matter is to
begin with the full text of K.H.s letter, as given by him on P. 425 of Mahatma Letters; far too long to be
quoted here. Moreover, on this particular page, I am not writing for the general public, who would not be
at the pains to look up the original subject, but for those who know the outline and especially for
Theosophists, who seem to have bowed to the enemy.
If the full text is presented first, there is almost an end of the matter. If the letter to Sinnett, on P.22, had
contained the full text, we should never have heard of any Kiddle incident; for, this text takes the
attitude towards Spiritualism and its respectable gropings after the truth to which we have long been
accustomed in Isis Unveiled and the early Theosophist. If a man were accused of stealing a marked
penny but could prove that he had a hundred pounds in his pocket and that the penny exactly made up the
change from a shilling he had used for a purchase, what jury would not dismiss the case? This illustrates
K.H.s position (although an allegory must not be run to death). We are sure, at least, that, however Mr.
Kiddles pennyworth of wisdom got into K.H.s intellectual pocket, the full text of K.H.s letter shows the
familiar way in which he would naturally have dealt with it.
However, I think that there is something extremely important behind all this apparent carelessness of
K.H.; that provoked, three years later, a great pother about this plagiaristic nothing and vastly
contributed to the public notion that Mahatmas did not exist, that to search for them in Tibet or anywhere
else (and H.P.B.s foes would have raised the money for an expedition permitted by Government in a few
hours!) would be to seek the residence of moonshine.
Temararious as the idea may seem, I venture to suggest that the Chiefs had a hand in this letter. Things
Theosophical were, as we know, going much too fast for their approval. On P.425, K.H. speaking of the
Kiddle incident, significantly remarks: Verily the light of . . . infallible prevision on this earth . . .
shines for the highest Chohan alone. When the row was at its height, he said (P.324): You have seen by
the Kiddle incident perchance allowed to develop to its bitter end for a purpose that even an adept
when acting in his body is not beyond mistakes due to human carelessness. Most significant is the fact
that the original letter (P. 22.) actually opens with a partial description of the process of precipitation of
writing on to blank paper. This looks rather like prevision of the challenge to come! And K.H.,
*
Which is a quite different thing fromthe contempt for phenomena so often expressed by Theosophists. Every act of an
adept as an adept is phenomenal; and no-one without the psychic germs could ever become a true chela. And how could any
lodge without incipient chelas even get in touch with the Masters?
21
dictating, as this original letter is made to testify, when half asleep after a 48 hours ride, explains: Of
course, I have to read every word you write, otherwise, I would make a fine mess of it . . . As much may
be said of my replies . . . I have to think it over, to photograph every word and sentence carefully in my
brain before it can be repeated by precipitation.
If K. H. were being charged with precipitation of this letter, this explanation of the process would
undoubtedly go far to convict him! It seems, indeed, previsional; and, when, later, the egregious Mr. A.
Lillie, the treacherous Dr. G. Wyld and friends were laughing at the Mahatmas account of the
precipitation as an invented dodge, the account came as no surprise to the persons who mattered, to
Sinnett, Subba Rao and other Theosophists.
Even the attack seems to have been foreseen. The letter ends:
But think you the spirit and power of persecution gone from this enlightened age? Time will show.
Meanwhile, being human I have to rest. I took no sleep for over sixty hours. Ever yours truly, Koot
Hoomi.
* * *
Two months later, K.H. refers casually to the fact of Precipitation having become unlawful (P. 33.), as
though Sinnett had been made aware of this through H.P.B. A legitimate inference to be drawn is that the
Chiefs had perceived the muddle of the letter while it was in process, or in contemplation in K.H.s tired
mind, had inspired him with passages for a defence, while allowing to remain this valuable proof that
the Mahatmas existed nowhere outside H.P.B.s plagiaristic brain, but stopped precipitation as likely to
create further incidents.
It cannot be too often remembered that, from the beginning to the end, the Chiefs are shown as only
tolerating, when not forbidding, any publicity given to the Order and disapproving of every Theosophical
activity but the practical work of furthering Universal Brotherhood. And, from the first, Mahatma K.H.
warned H.P.B. that indiscriminate phenomena would recoil on her.
*
She did not take the warning, but
went on; invoking the help of advanced chelas when the Masters turned away their heads, as we see in the
Sassoon telegram incident. And, no doubt, the chelas, as well as she, got the reward of exercising their
personal right to perform follies. However slavish a chela may have to be with regard to rules directly
affecting the Order, we see them left quite free in their personal doings ,for which they alone have to take
the consequences. When Sinnett published his Occult World, with the Kiddle letter uncorrected,
without submitting the proofs to the Mahatma, he asked for trouble, and got it; he was rather in too
much of a hurry.
* * *
To the student of the Mahatma Letters, it becomes ever clearer that these are a practical manual for
chelas, where the living models fall in and out of every conceivable trap for their loyalty, intelligence
and morality, and where the mysterious hand works in the lights for those coming after.
22
SECTION 3.
THE MAHATMA LETTERS AND
MESSRS. HARE.
The dog who barks at the Chief gets his name mentioned with the Chiefs, says a Zulu proverb. The two
Hares have got their names mentioned with those of the Mahatmas. Much good may it do them!
I never thought that I could be bored by any book, however bad, on a subject of which the documentation
has proved quite the most fascinating of the several such adventures I have undertaken. But Messrs. Hare
bored me. The pretentious staleness of their writing and their common facetiousness reduced me to the
impotent hysteria of scribbling on a margin, O Frumps! Only a playwright in search of material for an
academic farce could have patience with these two individuals who stick on their frusty hats dozens of the
most brilliant plumes belonging to the greatest writers of the world.
Informing us that he had neither read nor looked into any Theosophical literature (before beginning a task
that the best-informed student might shrink from), the friend Hare who writes the Preface, and most of the
book, apparently fancies that we shall welcome him for his ignorance, and pompously offers himself the
following posy
I give these personal particulars only to show that, so far as the absence of prejudice might qualify me as
a reader or critic of the work, I was fitted to peruse with impartiality the compilation hereafter examined.
Consequently, I read the Mahatma Letters in the spirit of a student, and observed (as much for my own
ease as from a sense of justice to other parties) the counsel of Bacons essay Of Studies: Read not to
contradict and refute, nor to believe and take for granted, nor to find talk and discourse, but to weigh and
consider.
The attitude of certain literary reviews (that did welcome Messrs. Hares book) towards H. P. Blavatsky
and Theosophical history, bound as this is, with the history of India, could not better be indicated than by
their failure to rebuke this verbose clowning. I can think of no exact parallel with such impertinence; the
nearest might be to imagine a man who had never read J ohnson or Boswell sitting down to judge the
authorship of a packet of letters supposedly written by one of them, the said letters dealing with the works
and lives of both and with the private history of dozens of their friends and acquaintances and enemies of
whom the said man had never so much as heard the names.
* * *
Friend Hare found, however, that to do justice to the Letters, he had to read at least the Occult World
and Esoteric Buddhism [by Sinnett]. Then, he had hardly settled to his task, thus equipped, when the
Theosophist began to publish monthly extracts from the early history of the Society. Yet, says Mr.
Hare, while topics increased, time pressed. The Mahatma Letters had gone through four reprints . . .
Time pressed! What for? Bacon might answer To contradict and refute, to find talk and discourse, to
get out a sensational book in a hurry and catch an ignorant and prejudiced public.
The very first fact delivered to this public is wrong: The Letters were not published in September,
1923", but in December. But this is an airy trifle compared with the colossal riot of wrong dates ramping
through this worthless volume of ignorance and double-dealing. I will give a list later.
23
Mr. Hare vaguely informs his public that he was fortunate enough to obtain permission to examine by
commission both the Mahatma Letters and the Letters of H. P. Blavatsky to A. P. Sinnett series of
manuscripts. He did not see them, but his brother Hare, his commissionaire, a one-time Theosophist, was
allowed to go once, before witnesses, through the vast series one evening, and during this rapid scramble
beat even the notoriously bad record of handwriting experts by judging on a glimpse! Even Netherclift,
who at first came to the conclusion that Madame Blavatsky did not write the K.H. letters (S.P.R. Report.
Dec. 1885. Mr. Hodgsons Report on Phenomena connected with the Theosophical Society P. 282); and
later decided that she did (ibid.), and who distinguished himself by attributing the Pigott forgery to an
innocent man even Netherclift might have hesitated where Mr. Hare rushes in, that is, on a single
cursory examination, and decides that H.P.B. wrote the letters.
* * *
In my rle of documentarian, I was obliged to examine Messrs. Hares volume with excruciating
closeness. One never knows what may crop up even in the bogs of Blavatskiana. Briefly, for the moment, I
made over two hundred notes. Of these, fourteen referred to errors of date, forty-two (and I found more) to
errors of fact, twelve to unabashed discoveries of Americas discovered fifty years ago; one hundred and
forty nine came under the composite heading: Misquotations, deliberate misquotations, cunning
misplacements of matter, misleading verbalisms, errors of juxtaposition, deliberate misjuxtaposition,
misleading references and inferences (scarcely to be imagined!) and ignorant statements due to lack of
study, (inexcusable ignorance, for the records are to be had for the search).
It will scarcely be believed by students that Messrs. Hare utilise Sinnetts dates. Imagine persons dealing
with the Kiddle incident and forming a theory based on the dates as given in the Letters and guessing at
those not given (but all discoverable with patience); such persons exist: Messrs. Hare. Imagine persons
using a letter written by H.P.B. in 1882 (M.L. P.464.) as if it belonged to the 1885 period; setting out to
do detective work and believing that a letter concerning the Coulombs, who vanished from the Adyar
household in May, 1884, might have been written about April 6, 1885", and even unable to copy
accurately this (fancy) date from the S.P.R. Report, where it occurs as April 26th, (1884); treating
Mahatma M.s thirteenth letter as his first, simply because it comes first as published, and unable to
identify another communication from him after Page 450" (M.L.), although there are in the book eleven
more signed; such persons exist: Messrs. Hare. And, in case such ineptitude as this last may be doubted, I
quote verbatim from Messrs. Hares book, Who wrote the Mahatma Letters?, P. 132:
I will write more tomorrow says M. in his last letter in the book (P.450), but we cannot identify another
communication from him. A fine authority certain literary reviews have passed on to their readers, while
suppressing letters of correction sent in by several experts on the subject! The future critic may feel
distinctly disobliged.
* * *
Here is a list of wrong dates, wrong even by whole years:
Messrs. Hare. Correction.
P.68. Eight months later, in October, 1883 . . . The letter quoted here by Messrs. Hare under heading,
[Letter LV. in M.L.] Some Vital Errors, was not written until Oct. 1884
A rather vital error!
P.69. Six months later. Meaning, after their Oct. 1883". And thus they build!
24
P.105. 1881, when the letter was written . . . September 28, 1882.
[Letter X.]
P.140. Letter LV, received . . . early 1883 . . . Oct. 2, 1884. They are now using this letter that
has become early! to prove something else.
P.140 Letter LXIII, written J anuary, 1884, Sinnett says simply, Received London, Summer, 1884.
received Summer, 1884. Messrs. Hare must have seen it written in some
Astral booby trap! Mrs. Holloway, mentioned,
only arrived from U.S.A. in May, or early J une.
Date of letter is November at earliest, when
Mrs. H. and H.P.B. were at loggerheads.
Olcotts letter to Finch is mentioned.
P. 141. Letter LXV, received London, Copied from Sinnetts memo.
Summer, 1884" Correct date is Mar. 27, 1885. H.P.B.
was at Adyar, Hodgson too.
Miss Mary Neff supplies the exact day.
The three last wrong dates given above are referred to by Messrs. Hare thus (italics mine): The evidence
in the case is contained in the following five Mahatma Letters to Mr. Sinnett.
* * *
On next page, 141, they state: In Letter LV, undated, but probably received by Mr. Sinnett early in 1883,
when staying near Madame Blavatsky at Elberfeld in Germany, there are references by K.H. to a coming
crisis in the affairs of the Theosophical Society, and warnings of a number of dangers in the path. I
warned you all through Olcott in April last of what was ready to burst at Adyar, and told him not to be
surprised when the mine should be fired..
Messrs. Hare are using this quotation in connection with the Kiddle incident of an alleged plagiarism.
Students will puff with laughter, knowing that the quotation is from a letter written April 5, 1884, when
H.P.B. was in Paris and had never been to Elberfeld and refers, not to Kiddle at all, but to the Coulomb
plot!
* * *
On P.142, Messrs. Hare go bumbling on about Letter LXIII, received in London, 1884" and, on next
page, about Letter LXV, following the above this Letter LXV actually being written at least six
months later.
* * *
They make one other capital error worth a space, on P.221: In a letter referring to a Headquarters crisis,
dated Summer, 1884, K.H. says: Damodar went to Tibet.
The correct date of K.H.s letter is March 27, 1885. Damodar left for Tibet on Feb. 23rd, 1885.
25
* * *
I now show Messrs. Hare in the rle of deliberate misleaders. On P. 119, they tell the public that The
Mahatmas style in handling mundane affairs appears in the following phrases:. I give their list and,
opposite, the true reference of the phrases. The page numbers refer to Mahatma Letters.
P. 39 that you, at least mean business; Refers to Sinnet as a Theosophical worker.
P.60. Some thirty-five years back, Refers to Mayers hypothesis of matter as indestructible.
P.202. considering how tight the negotiations Does refer to mundane affairs, the Phoenix news
prove; paper proposal
.
P.259. And now we will talk: Refers to Sinnetts occult studies
P.263. The hopes of their original backers; Refers to the Founders of the T.S. when starting a new
cycle of research.
P.269. send you a telegram and answer Refers to Humes correspondence concerning an Anglo-
on back ont; Indian Branch.
P.270. if he would not break with the Refers to ditto.
whole shop altogether;
P.271. we will split the difference and shake Refers to English v. Tibetan customs.
astral hands;
P.271. and square the discussion; Refers to Sinnetts frankness during the above discussion.
P.271. and I like it the more, I promise you; Refers to ditto.
P.272. Only look out sharp; Refers to Dugpa adeptsevil activities in England.
P. 289. I have very little time to explore back Refers to Eliphas Levi, the French Kabbalist.
letters;
One scarcely knows how to characterise such unscrupulousness, at least, in a style possible for print.
* * *
In the next paragraph, P.129, Messrs. Hare quote eleven phrases where, so they tell their public, the
Mahatmas pens on worldly business are dipped in gall. Only the first phrase, from P.37

M.L.,

the
famous skunk mephitis description of Home the medium, has any gall in it; and I suppose that few doubt
that this was one of H.P.B.s interpolations. The next phrase is
P.39. Her nerves are worked to a fiddlestring; K.H. on H.P.B.s weak health. Gall?
26
P.40. the Elementary spooks; Worldly business? Gall?
P. 67. it is extinguished, or, as H.P.B. has it Refers to the world in a state of minor pralaya.
snuffed out; Gall?
P.75. he is butting against the facts; Refers to speculations about the origin of man.
Gall?
P.196. some humdrum person, some colourless, Refers to an imaginary deceased person.
flackless personality; Worldly business? Gall?
The other phrases are; P.253. he was in the wrong box; P.256. If the laugh is not turned on the
Statesman; P. 312. what a Yankee would call a blazing cockahoop; P.326. he can play the deuce with
yourself and the society; P.370. as the Americans would say the fix I am in; P. 391 the almighty
smash that is in store for them.
I feel sure that the reader will rub his eyes and ask what on earth they mean. I cannot explain. I think they
mean nothing but malice and have overshot themselves.
* * *
When Messrs. Hare wish to prove that the Mahatmas authorised the publication of the substance of their
earlier letters, they quote: Of course you ought to write your book. Do so by all means, and any help I can
give you, I will . . . Take the Simla phenomena and your correspondence with me as the subject. I have
exactly transcribed. The student who turns to P.21 of the Letters will see that the dots and the capital T are
inventions! There is a full-stop after the I will, and a new sentence begins referring, not to the book, but
to correspondence with Lord Lindsay; and take etc. belongs to this subject. But I could fill pages on
pages with Messrs. Hares misquotations. On P.46, they quote the Mahatmas as saying that they are
guardians of the Tree of Life and Wisdom, citing P.31 of the Letters. Here is the true sentence: the
very science which leads to the highest goal of the highest knowledge, to the real tasting of the Tree of
Life and Wisdom is scouted as a wild flight of imagination.
There is a footnote on P.47, in which Messrs. Hare inform their public that Baron DHolbach was reputed
the greatest materialist of his time. On P.155 of the Letters, one reads I found a European author
the greatest materialist of his times, Baron DHolbach . . .. Our friends, who have borrowed most of the
stuff in their book, and hashed and staled even the old attacks almost beyond reading, borrow also from
the Mahatmas.
A shocking instance of the more deliberate misquotations is on P.63 : K. H. goes into the very technique
of transcendental acoustics to confound your physicists who are unacquainted with the occult powers of
air (akas) p.29. On P.29, M.L., we read: But then, may there not be people who have found a more
perfect and rapid means of transmission, from being somewhat better acquainted with the occult powers of
air (akas) and having plus a more cultivated judgment of sound? Not a word about confound your
physicists! The misquotation amounts to false-witness. In trying to make K.H. appear vulgar, Messrs.
Hare touch the bottom of vulgarity seen usually in police-courts. But, I repeat, another book would need to
be devoted just to rectifying all the double-dealings. Even the cad, Solovioff, (with whom I shall deal in a
later volume), appears more circumspect; being a professional writer, he could not help having some
27
respect for quotations from printed text. Messrs. Hare have none for this or for the reviewers who, after
all, are not all rabid against Blavatsky and expect a certain literary decency from people who submit
books, professedly documentary, for review.
Messrs. Hare make use half a dozen times of the word omniscient, as if said by the Mahatmas of
themselves. The word was once used by Sinnett, not by the Mahatmas, who frequently rebuked Sinnett for
assuming their infallibility.
Messrs. Hare cite K.H. as saying, on P.324 of the Letters, that the topic of the Kiddle plagiarism will
one day equal in interest the Bacon-Shakespeare mystery. On P.324, we read: If fame is sweet to him
[Kiddle] why will he not be consoled with the thought that the case of the Kiddle-K.H. parallel passages
has now become as much a cause clbre in the department of who is who and which plagiarised from
the other? as the Bacon-Shakespeare mystery; that in intensity of scientific research, if not of value, our
case is on a par with that of our great predecessors. One might fancy one were reading Arnold when
spitting his wit with some rather oafish Professor Newman. I take the opportunity here of comparing this
characteristic urbanity of K.H. with H.P.B.s own explosive treatment of the matter. (Blavatsky to
Sinnett. P.66): K.H. plagiarised from Kiddle! Ye gods and little fishes. And suppose he has not? Of
course they the subtle metaphysicians will not believe the true version of the story as I know it. So much
the worse for the fools and Sadducees . . . Plagiarise from the Banner of Light! that sweet spirits slop-
basin the asses!
* * *
Messrs. Hare decorate their duncery not only with tags from the great, but with lurid popular-Press
captions. Under one of these, Blavatsky at Bay, P.267, and carrying on with elegant taste to De
Profundis period after the issue of the S.P.R. Report of Dec. 1885, we find Messrs. Hare beginning
their eternal facetious chortle with a quotation from a letter from H.P.B. to Sinnett that happens to be
printed at the very end of the Mahatma Letters, and is only dated March 17th. This letter, CXXXVI in
the series, was really written in 1882, when H.P.B. was a bit in the dumps and refused an invitation to
Sinnetts house at Allahabad. Try again, Messieurs!
How it must irk these people to know that H.P.B. ended her days with devoted, and almost worshiping,
intimate friends, several living in the same house with her having completed her task! And these
friends were no small fry, either, but G. R. S. Mead and his wife, Dr. Archibald Keightley, Emily
Kislingbury, Annie Besant, Walter Old, Countess Wachtmeister, Herbert Burrows, Sinnett and his
adorable wife, W. T. Stead and Saladin, of the Agnostic J ournal, who wrote in an obituary article:
Theosophy or no Theosophy, the most extraordinary woman of our century, or of any century, has passed
away. Yesterday, the world had one Madame Blavatsky today, it has none. One recalls Olcotts bitter
cry Ah, cruel world! When will you have another H.P.B. to torture?
Alack! I must return to these Hares who have barked at the Chief.
* * *
Messrs. Hares volume is not quite all dull reading for the student, although the fun to be had out of it is
not an intentional offering on their part. It is sufficiently humourous to see them facetiously poking at
Mahatma Ms ribs for his remark that he could not write English with a brush. They profess to be
mystified (P.131). M. is an Indian and if he writes in his native manner, he would use a pen . . . A
28
brush is a Chinese writing tool! where is the point of saying he cannot write English with a brush? On
p.84 K.H. says of M. that he knows very little English and hates writing; which implies, we suppose,
that he is debarred from precipitating and obliged to use a hateful alternative a pen. Again, on P.132:
The seven citations given above prove conclusively that Mahatma Morya does not claim for himself the
ability to precipitate writing. We have no interest in depriving him of this remarkable power . . . and so
on and so on through whole pages and pages about the mystery of precipitation, of which Messrs. Hare
may know as much as a steam whistle. And discussing the faculties of a Mahatma who does not even
exist!
Mahatma Morya must have foreknown the advent of the Hares and laid a trap for them, for his chela,
H.P.B., in one of her letters to Sinnett (H.P.B. to A.P.S. P.32), makes the devastating revelation that she
had often seen M. sit with a book of the most elaborate Chinese characters that he wanted to copy, and a
blank book before him, and he would put a pinch of black lead dust before him and then rub it in slightly
on the page; and then over it precipitate ink; and then, if the image of the characters was all right and
correct in his mind, the characters copied would be all right . . .
But, no doubt, our friends Hare will object now that H.P.B. does not claim that M. ever wrote elaborate
Chinese characters with a brush before attempting to precipitate them without a brush, and that, therefore,
they remain mystified as to why M. should talk about a brush at all, he being an Indian; and they will
wag their fingers still and impute laxity to both Mr. Sinnett and Mr. J inarajadasa in attributing to the
Mahatmas together in respect of all their Letters a power which only one of them claimed for a limited
number of his own (P.132.). (Italics not mine.) Mr. Sinnett certainly attributed nothing of the sort. He
knew that precipitation (through chelas, anyway), was stopped by the Chiefs before M came in at all; in
the Occult World, he was only dealing with the early Letters that were precipitated.
But a few more paragraphs of this kind, and Messrs. Hares public may begin to wonder worriedly
whether or not it is to believe that the Mahatmas really exist! On P.39, our friends have already made a
bad break: Tchigadze . . . is a little south of Lhasa, on the river Tsang-Po, and it would not surprise us
to learn that it is the exoteric abode of the Mahatmas. Sans autre commentaire!
* * *
Messrs. Hares notions about the Disinherited and Damodar, the Bombay youth who became a chela
and went to Tibet, make almost hilarious reading. They quote, on P.222, from H.P.B. to Sinnett (P.10):
Disinherited wants to write to you he says if you permit him through Damodar; and they comment
with a shriek, Through Damodar? Disinherited is Damodar! Why this pretence of duality? I laugh
helplessly.
The first reference in the Letters to the Disinherited is on P.34; date about Feb. 20, 1881. He signs a
footnote to one of K.H.s letters and is evidently an advanced chela and an expert at phenomena, who,
indeed, had assisted on Oct. 3rd, 1880, when the famous cup and saucer phenomenon took place, these
being found embedded in the roots of a tree. Damodar was then known to Sinnett as a very young
secretary of the Society and an even younger candidate for adeptship. Sinnett would have been surprised
to learn, as friends Hare teach us, that Damodar was cut off by his father for his attachment to H.P.B. and
the rule of the Masters, and received in consequence the nickname of the Disinherited. I have said that
the D. wrote on Feb. 20th, 1881. Fortunately for H.P.B., on Feb. 18th, Damodar was still sufficiently in
funds to present her with a carriage at Bombay. Actually, he never was disinherited, but, some time later,
29
was given the choice for life between a tolerable fortune and loyalty to the Masters and the Society. He
renounced the fortune.
* * *
Messrs. Hares next discovery is of Damodars motive in leaving Adyar for good, in 1885, namely to
escape from the tricks played on him. Damodars diary on the way to Tibet, naming groups and
individuals whom he visited right up to the frontier, was published by Olcott from the original now at
Adyar. Damodar laments the apathy and lack of zeal he saw in several Branches. In Old Diary Leaves,
Vol. 3, P.359 and onward, Olcott describes his own meeting near Darjiling with the chief jemindar who,
with the under coolies, escorted Damodar over the frontier in April, 1885, and brought back his diary.
Olcotts interpreter was no less a personage than the celebrated Sarat Chandra Dass, mentioned in all
books on that period, expert on Tibet (T. Tatya familiarly speaks of him as the English spy at Tibet),
and Hon. Sec. of the Buddhist Text Society, C.T.E., and other distinguished things. Not a man to be jested
with! Damodars diary runs from Feb. 23rd to April 3rd, after which date he proceeded alone, having been
carried by the coolies over the first ghats. The head coolie reported that he had seen Damodar make
connection with a caravan going to Lhasa under the direction of a Tibetan dignitary. The which speaks for
itself. No Tibetan accepts an obscure and penniless and passportless Hindu as passenger to Lhasa without
orders to do so.
It does look rather as though the Mahatmas existed!
* * *
Messrs. Hare, these literary hod-men, make pages of fuss concerning K.H.s slip in saying ascension for
resurrection in his first letter. Well . . . a slip. What about it? Many English writers have made slips.
Also, K.H. slipped in naming Bacon as one of the personal founders of the Royal Society, instead of being
merely the acknowledged inspiration of those who did found it. K.H. evidently knew the inside story of
the foundation. How many English men of letters could relate it? It is not what K.H. does not know, but
what he does, that is astonishing. The world knows now that he was acquainted with Tennysons earliest
poems, for quotation from one of which (P.51. M.L.) Messrs. Hare accuse him of libelling the poet by
foisting on to him six lines of very poor verse. Very poor Hares, with their caption, A Libel on a
Laureate! Mr. Charles Tennyson told Miss M. Thomas where to look for the lines.
In the O. E. Library Critic (Washington, U.S.A.) for Aug-Sep, 1936, Dr. Stokes comments: The joke is
on the Hares. If the reader will refer to Sinnetts book, Tennyson an Occultist (pp.56-7), published in 1920
. . . he will find it stated that these six lines of verse form the conclusion of a poem of 46 lines entitled
The Mystic, published by Tennyson in 1830 in a volume, Poems Chiefly Lyrical, but for some unknown
reason omitted from later editions of his works.
The six lines, as quoted by Mahatma K.H. on P.51, M.L. read
How could ye know him? Ye were yet within
The narrower circle; he had well-nigh reached
The last, which, with a region of white flame,
Pure without heat into a larger air
Up-burning, and an ether of black-blue,
Invests and ingirds all other lives . . .
30
In the original, invests is written investeth.
Incidentally, this letter is the one that Madame Coulomb alleged, and poor Sinnett came to believe, was
dropped through a trap in the ceiling. And the wonderful three final pages are just those that Madame
Coulomb declared that she saw H.P.B. write, in fits of laughter, we are to suppose, at the trick played on
Sinnett. The Coulomb knew (probably through her ear at the keyhole, a little usual amusement of hers
which she actually confessed to Hodgson) that Sinnett had been surprised not to receive a letter the night
before, and she invented this yarn to fill up the gap with some more of her personal evidence.
Several students better qualified than I to deal with Latin scholarship have rapped Messrs. Hares
knuckles for their meddling in this sphere; but I remark that their French (correction) exploits are of the
schoolboy order. On P.94 and onward, they tell us about Reincarnation Misunderstood (by K.H.) In a
letter to Sinnett, Number IX of M.L., K.H. writes: Tell Massey that you were possessed of the Oriental
views of reincarnation several months before the work in question [Kingsford-Maitlands Perfect Way]
appeared since it is in J uly eighteen months ago that you began being taught the difference between
Reincarnation la Kardec, or personal rebirth and that of the spiritual monad; a difference first pointed
out to you on J uly 5th, at Bombay.
I have no concern here with the main question, the theory of reincarnation, merely saying that in spite of
blinds in both, I find Isis confirmed, not contradicted, in the Letters. What I want to point out is
Messrs. Hares ignorance of French. They object, that K.H. did not actually name Kardec in the J uly letter
(neither does he say he did; he says pointed out inference: while Sinnett discussed the letter (IX)
with H.P.B., he being at Bombay, not on the 5th, but on the 8th); but they seem unaware that the la
indicates Kardecs theory as a known one, so well-known as to need no further explanation. The inference
of the Hares that H.P.B. (forging as K.H.) ignored Kardec is almost too absurd for comment; she
frequented the French spirite circle before going to America, and Kardec is mentioned in her early
writings. Further, K.H. does not say, on P.46, that Mrs. Kingsfords idea is the true one, as quoted by
Messrs. Hare; he says, thus far, Mrs. Kingsfords etc. And, for anyone who knows the subject, the whole
of the matter in Letter IX distinguishes between the spiritual monad (an Isis term well-known to Sinnett)
and the personal ego.
In the Preface to their book, Mr. H. E. Hare ascribes to his brother, Mr. W.L., special knowledge of the
subject of Reincarnation. Why does he not give it out? The world is waiting for this! A pity that he had no
special knowledge of the text even of the Mahatma Letters, for then he would not now be misinforming
and misleading the public in scores of instances, ever so many more than I can find space to notice here.
Really, Messrs. Hares book is one long verbal rough and tumble.
* * *
They discover the old America of similarity between K.H. and H.P.B. in the use of what they call key-
words. The first they cite Try, is of course, a real Theosophical key-word and is never, I think, to be
found used unless in italics or inverted commas. The second, but in the sense of only, might put me in
the dock as confederate with many other writers who frequently use it. Messrs. Hare admit that but was
much used in the 19th century, and seem to fancy that it has died out except in America. In any case, both
K.H. and H.P.B. wrote in the 19th century, so there would be nothing remarkable in their use of the word.
The third keyword is though. Messrs. Hare state that this is placed at the end of a sentence without a
preceding comma. They give twelve examples from Isis and Blavatskys Letters to Sinnett. Of these
*
Still, this subject is very difficult, and would need many pages; it is not a question of mere arithmetic.
31
twelve, ten are incorrectly transcribed from the text, and, of course, in such a way as not to weaken
Messrs. Hare's theory. Only ten out of twelve! Only one example shows a full-stop in the text. Messrs.
Hare invent seven full-stops! In the five examples given with a dash by Messrs. Hare, no dash exists in the
text; and, in every case but one, the sentence carries on after a comma or a semi-colon. I cite one of
Messrs. Hares examples, the one from Isis, transcribing exactly.
Messrs. Hare. P.181. Isis Unveiled, Isis Unveiled. Vol. 2, P. 621.It is more than
p.621 more than probable though. probable though, that the Talapoins will, etc.
This use of though is seen, also, in many writers and maybe very effective when the wit needs to jump, a
literary mystery extra-Hare.
I cannot believe that the most anti reviewer would be pleased to know that his brains had been stocked
with so much misinformation. After all, brains are precious things, and they wear out.
* * *
That H.P.B.s style changed considerably parallel with the first Mahatma letters received in New York,
and much more so when the Indian series began, is evident, and is a point against, not for, the charge of
fraud. Even in idiosyncracies, she seems to imitate K.H. The famous dash found in the Letters and in
H.P.B.s own letters after 1880, is hardly to be remarked in the American articles and letters. A letter to
Aksakov, transcribed by Mr. Walter Leaf from Solovioffs copy (where the so-called evidential dashes
would certainly not be diminished) shows only two dashes, perfectly well-placed, in three printed pages.
The equally famous italics are similarly absent, except when she is writing on spiritualistic or occult
matters, and, even so, only in certain private letters. Her first letter to Professor Corson, of three printed
pages, contains two dashes and one phrase in italics, both well-placed. Letter No. 4, of seven and a half
printed pages, contains two dashes and five words in italics.
*
I wish that Theosophists would spare time from their own salvation to look into these things. A group of
experts on the documents could very soon make it worth no publisher's while to print such rubbish as this
Hare book.
The above idiosyncracies belong to the Mahatma Letters, early and late series and . . . If I were looking
for a code, I should begin to count them. In copying every detail of the Letters, perhaps Mr. Barker acted
even more faithfully than he knew. (But, I do grudge the employ of that terrible split-infinitive! In future
editions for the wider public, it ought to be corrected. The reason for it no longer exists.)
* * *
Was Madame Blavatsky ever in Tibet?, ask Messrs. Hare. And, of course, they talk about legend. Yet,
they cite (from Mr. Baseden Butts book, Madame Blavatsky, not from the original in Olcotts Old
Diary Leaves, of which they exhibit a score of times complete ignorance) the evidence of Major-General
Murray (Captain Murray, in 1854, and Commandant on the Nepal-Tibet frontier) that he had found H.P.B.
on the frontier in 1854 and had kept her a month in his house with his wife.
32
Personally, I think that H.P.B. was not going to Tibet, but returning. But, in any case, how did this foreign
woman get to the frontier? Hookers Himalayan J ournals show what a colossal adventure it was even
for him, with Government support, with money, with interpreters, with coolies to carry water, provisions,
bedding, tents and all the paraphernalia, including guns, necessary for even a one-man expedition. He
could not take a step without his doings being known to the monasteries. At every turn, he was required to
show his papers, signed by both English and local officials; and they were visaed everywhere. He
narrowly escaped death a score of times in the vast deserts of ice and on the frozen, foggy mountains. In
many places, the people refused to sell him any food, and his coolies fell ill and had to return, etc., etc.
And here, a woman arrives at Commandant Murrays house, without any proper passports or coolies or
or anything; having somehow waltzed over the deserts and gulfs and precipices and escaped all notice by
the population and the spies. H.P.B. never told this story, even to Olcott. Major-General Murray never told
it until after she was dead. One may well imagine that he found the facts so mysterious that he thought he
had better hold his peace; for, without high protection, neither man nor woman could then have gone a
mile in that country. (One has only to read the various Munchausens who say that they have been to Tibet
in disguise to see that the famous Baron may be equalled. All the heroes and heroines go through
appalling adventures going to Lhasa, and all come back in a few pages without a hitch on the road.
For the public that buys the sensation, the thing, of course, is to get to Lhasa, never mind about coming
back.)
* * *
But what would not Hodgson of the Society for Psychical Research have given to know that H.P.B. was
really in India in 1854 while the Mutiny was beginning to boil up? What a clue for his Russian Spy
theory! He could have hunted her into prison merely on this clue, while the whole secret police of India
set to work to try to ferret out her movements. Perhaps the Mahatmas, her confederates, whispered in
Murrays ear, as well as closed her own lips?
* * *
On P.286 of the Letters, K.H. writes: I hope these disjointed reflections and explanations may be
pardoned in one who remained for over nine days in his stirrups without dismounting.
Of course, Messrs. Hare fall right in! They opine that the Mahatmas horse should have been mentioned in
the dispatches. No doubt it was. J ust as the dead buffalo that Gautama kicked with his toe over a
city had a mention in that parable. When the Hares of humanity begin to be able to control even the
grinning tic in their cheeks, they may be told a bit more about such things as stirrups and dead
buffaloes.
* * *
I must say farewell to Messrs. Hare, while assuring Theosophists that these precious detractors in a hurry,
for Time pressed, might be dished on almost every page if they were worth the space. Practically
every point they imagine to make turns out to be no point at all. They are wrong about mostly everyone
and everything. Wrong about Damodar, Bowaji, Djwal Khool and down to Eglinton and Leadbeater;
wrong in saying that there were never any witnesses to the Mahatmas but H.P.B. There were Olcott,
Damodar, Subba Rao, Mrs. Cooper-Oakley, W. T. Brown, Dr. Hartmann, Madame Fadeef, Countess
Wachtmeister, Mlle. Glinka, Ramaswamier and several other well-placed and intellectual Indians. All
33
these had independent evidence of the Mahatmas and we must not forget Solovioff, who turned traitor,
but whose testimony to the S.P.R. is on record.
Messrs. Hare are wrong in chortling over K.H.s writing going to Tibet (M.L. P.438) and the test of
the Times to be brought here (P.247) and Damodar went to Tibet (P.363.) They think the conclusion is
obvious that the letters were written at the Theosophical headquarters. Possibly! For, if we are going to
be so meticulous, we may find evidence that, on all three occasions, the Mahatma was not in Tibet, but in
India.
The first was written on March 25th, 1882, the day after the Vega phenomenon (for which, by the way, I
need only a couple of dates to complete a very pretty case for the defence), when the two Masters were in
Calcutta and had been seen by Olcott the night before. The second dates March 18th, 1882, same period.
The third dates March 27th, 1885, four days before H.P.B. sailed on her last voyage to Europe. The
Mahatma M. was certainly in India and had been seen some time before by Mrs. Cooper-Oakley,
Leadbeater, Hartmann, Damodar and others, when he suddenly appeared along the passage, saluted them,
opened the door of the room where Mrs. Cooper-Oakley was fearing H.P.B.s last breath, and passed in.
As M. and K.H. frequently travelled together, and as a miracle was to be worked on H.P.B. to keep her
alive, we may suppose that K.H. was not far away.
* * *
Messrs. Hare are so pleased to get in a slap at the smoking Mahatma that they give him and Tobacco in
their Index. They quote, as authorities, Dr. McGovern and Mr. Knight to prove that tobacco smoking in
Tibet is the most heinous vice, the greatest crime against religion and that it is strictly forbidden to
smoke in Tibet. Alack for them! Hooker mentions the exorbitant price paid at Lhasa for Indian tobacco
which was then much preferred to that mentioned by Huc as cultivated in East Tibet. In Sport and Travel
in Tibet, Messrs. Hayden and Cosson tell us (P.8.) that smoking was forbidden by the late Dalai Lama, an
order not universally obeyed. So, we see that this heinous vice, this crime against religion was nothing
but the freak order of one man.
* * *
Messrs. Hare are mostly wrong about everything and everyone, and, where they might he right, they
deliberately distort. Yet, I conclude on a vote of thanks to them. Their reproduction, at some cost, of the
signature of Mahatma K.H. (in the MS. it comes at foot of the letter printed on P.17, M.L.), the which
signature they take to be a bungling attempt at Devanagari, but which, of course, is a code script, allows
the world to realise that here was no faltering pen, but an expert at work.
34
SECTION 4.
MAHATMA K.H. AND SINNETT.
One of the most frequent taunts that Sinnett had to endure was that he, in spite of all his devotion and
sacrifice, had never been favoured with a personal interview with Mahatma K.H. The publication of the
Mahatma Letters and Letters from H. P. Blavatsky to A.P. Sinnett allow us to see light on this
mystery.
* * *
(M.L. P.28.) Date: Feb. 20, 1881. K.H. to Sinnett:
We might leave out of the question the most vital point one you would hesitate perhaps to believe
that the refusal concerned as much your own salvation (from the standpoint of your worldly material
considerations) as my enforced compliance with our time-honoured Rules. Again, I might cite the case of
Olcott (who, had he not been permitted to communicate face to face and without any intermediary
with us, might have subsequently shown less zeal and devotion but more discretion) and his fate up to the
present. But the comparison would doubtless appear to you strained. Olcott you would say is an
enthusiast, a stubborn unreasoning mystic, who goes headlong before him, blindfolded, and who will not
allow himself to look forward with his own eyes. While you are a sober, matter-of-fact man of the world,
the son of your generation of cool thinkers; ever keeping fancy under the curb, and saying to enthusiasm:
Thus far shalt thou go, and no farther! . . . Perhaps you are right perhaps not. No Lama knows where
the ber-chhn will hurt him until he puts it on, says a Tibetan proverb. However, let that pass, for I must
tell you now that for opening direct communication the only possible means would be: (1) For each of us
to meet in our own physical bodies. I being where I am, and you in your quarters, there is a material
impediment for me.
K.H. then indicates two occult ways of meeting which need not be mentioned here. The above sufficiently
indicates that the Masters did not think that Sinnett was the stuff of which chelas are made. He was not
prepared, like Olcott, to throw up every worldly consideration; or, like Ramaswamier, to set out to find
the Masters or die. Evidently, also, K.H. was debarred from taking a railway journey in his own body
specially to meet Sinnett. We shall see that, when Sinnett received definite information, and had the
opportunity to take a railway journey to find the Mahatma he let it go by.
(H.P.B. to Sinnett. P.28.) Date : a week or so before J une 29, 1882:
My dear Mr. Sinnett, . . . My plans are burst. The Old One [Chief] wont let me go [to Tibet], doesnt
want me. Says all kinds of serenades bad times; the English will be behind me (for they believe more in
the Russians than in the Brothers); their presence will prevent any Brother to come to me visibly, and
invisibly I can see them from where I am; wanted here and elsewhere, but not in Tibet, etc., etc. Well, I
can only beg pardon of you and the rest. I had all ready, the whole itinerary was sent from Calcutta, M.
gave me permission, and Deb was ready Well, you wont prevent me from saying now at least from the
bottom of my heart DAMN MY FATE, I tell you death is preferable. Work, work, work and no thanks .
. . Well, if I do feel crazy it is theirs not my fault not poor M. or K.H.s but theirs, of those heartless
dried-up big-bugs, and I must call them that if they pulverise me for it. What do I care now for life! . . .
Yours, H.P.B.
(M.L. P.116.) Date: J une 29, 1882. K.H. to Sinnett:
H.P.B. is in despair; the Chohan refused permission to M. to let her come this year further than the Black
35
Rock, and M. very coolly made her unpack her trunk. Try to console her if you can. Besides, she is really
wanted more at Bombay than at Penlore.
(M.L. P.125.) Date : J uly 25, 1882. Simla. Sinnett to H.P.B.:
We all feel so sorry for you, overworked amid the heat and the flies. When you have got the August
number [of Theosophist] off your hands, perhaps you could take flight for here and get a little rest
among us.
(H.P.B. to S. P.8.) Date: Aug. 12, 82. Bombay:
The heat and this working 26 hours out of the 24 is killing me. My head swims, my sight is becoming
dim and I am sure I will drop some day on my writing and be a corpse before the T.S. says bo. Well, I
dont care. And why the deuce should I? Nothing left for me here; then better become a spook at once and
come back and pinch my enemies noses . . . Goodbye, H.P.B. (that was).
(H.P.B. to S. P.356.) Date: Aug. 26, 82. Bombay, Damodar to Sinnett:
She is unwell and last evening the Doctor said that her whole blood is spoiled . . . I have been trying to
induce her to go beyond Darjiling or some such place for two or three months, where she will neither see
nor hear of the worlds vilest tricks which have been the chief cause of her ill-health.
(H.P.B. to S. P.34.) Date: early Sep. 1882. Bombay,
My dear Mr Sinnett, This morning, I got up from my bed for the first time this week. But never mind me.
Your letters . . . show that you are of the true stuff, and I only hope I wont die before you have been
rewarded for all your devotion and affection for K.H. by seeing him. And how easy oh gods! to see
him! Read this:
[Note from K.H. to H.P.B.] I will remain about 23 miles off Darjiling till Sep. 26th and if you come
you will find me in the old place.
(M.L. P.270.) Date: early Sep. 82. Mahatma M. to Sinnett:
. . . a woman so sick that as in 1877 I am again forced to carry her away . . . for fear she should fall all to
pieces.
(M.L. P. 292). Date: middle September, 1882. K.H. to Sinnett:
The Chohan gave orders that the young Tyotirmoy a lad of fourteen, the son of Babu Nobin K.
Banerjee, whom you know should be accepted as a pupil in one of our lamaseries near Chamto-Dong.
(M.L. P. 190.) Date: before Sep. 23, 82. K.H. to Sinnett:
I am not at home at present, but quite near to Darjiling, in the Lamasery, the object of poor H.P.B.s
longing. I thought of leaving by the end of September but find it rather difficult on account of Nobin's boy.
Most probably, also, I will have to interview in my own skin the Old Lady if M. brings her here. And
he has to bring here or lose her for ever at least as far as the physical triad is concerned. And now
goodbye, I ask you again do not frighten my little man; he may prove useful to you some day only
do not forget he is but an appearance. Yours, K.H.
The little man was Babaji, who was acting for one of K.H.s chelas, presumably Gwala K. Deb, whom
he resembled. We gather, from other letters, that Babaji considerably overstepped his orders.
(Letters from the Masters of Wisdom. Second series. P.163) Date: Oct. 7, 82. S. Ramaswamier
(Registrar at Tinevelly, then at Darjiling) to Damodar at Bombay:
. . . When we met last in Bombay I told you what had happened to me at Tinevelly. My health having
36
been disturbed by official work and worry, I applied for leave on medical certificate and it was granted.
One day in September last [about the 18th], while I was reading in my room, I was ordered by the audible
voice of my blessed Guru, M . . . Maharsi to leave all and proceed immediately to Bombay, whence I had
to go in search of Madame Blavatsky wherever I could find her and follow her wherever she went.
Without losing a moment, I closed up all my affairs and left the station . . . I travelled in my ascetic robes.
Arrived at Bombay, I found Madame Blavatsky gone, and learned through you that she had left the place a
few days before; that she was very ill; and that beyond the fact that she had left the place very suddenly
with a Chela, you knew nothing of her whereabouts. And now, I must tell you what happened to me after I
had left you.
Really not knowing whither I had best go, I took a through ticket to Calcutta; but on reaching Allahabad,
I heard the same well-known voice directing me to go to Berhampore.
. . . On the 23rd, at last, I was brought by Nobin Babu from Calcutta to Chandernagore where I found
Madame Blavatsky, ready to start five minutes after with the train. A tall dark-looking hairy Chela (not
Chunder Cusho) but a Tibetan I suppose by his dress . . . would not listen to my supplications to take me
with him, saying that he had no orders . . . the train, against all regulations and before the bell was rung
started off, leaving Nobin Babu, the Bengalees [some who had followed her from Calcutta] and her
servant behind . . . I myself had barely the time to jump into the last carriage.
. . . The first days of her arrival [at Darjiling], Madame Blavatsky was living at the house of a Bengalee
gentleman and refusing to see anyone; and preparing, as I thought, to go again somewhere on the borders
of Tibet. To all our importunities we could only get this answer from her; that we had no business to stick
to and follow her, that she did not want us . . .
In despair, I determined, come what might, to cross the frontier which is about a dozen miles from here,
and find the Mahatmas, or DIE.
. . . It was, I think, between eight and nine [next morning, Ramaswamier having travelled far and spent
the night in a jungle hut], and I was following the road to the town of Sikkim . . . when I suddenly saw a
solitary horseman galloping towards me. From his tall stature and the expert way he managed the animal, I
thought he was some military officer of the Rajah. Now, I thought, am I caught! He will ask me for my
pass and what business I have on the independent territory of Sikkhim and perhaps have me arrested and
sent hack, if not worse. But as he approached me, he reined the steed. I looked at and recognised him
instantly . . .
He told me to go no further, for I would come to grief.
. . . The Mahatma spoke to me in my mother-tongue Tamil! He told me that if the Chohan permitted
Madame B. to go to Pari-J ong next year, then I could come with her . . . And now that I have seen the
Mahatma in the flesh and heard his living voice, let no-one dare say to me that the Brothers do not exist.
Come now whatever will, death has no fear for me, nor the vengeance of enemies; for what I know, I
KNOW!
* * *
I have not, so far, come upon any data to show why Sinnett did not accept the invitation conveyed to him
in such unmistakably broad hints; so it is of no use to comment, unless to say that it looks as if he missed a
chance that was never again to be offered.
END OF VOLUME I.
1
INTRODUCTION
BEATRICE HASTINGS AND THE
DEFENCE OF MADAME BLAVATSKY
MICHAEL GOMES
In 1937 the publication in England of two slim volumes as part of an intended series on the Defence of
Madame Blavatsky introduced a new writer to the field of Theosophical history. Because she felt that she
would be unknown to Theosophists, Mrs. Beatrice Hastings prefaced her account with some background
about herself by selecting three quotes from the London press. Critic Victor Neuburg, in the 1934 Sunday
Referee is representative: Mrs. Hastings, the famous critic, star turn of the New Age when that paper was
by far the best-written in London. This was probably as much as most Theosophists who took an interest
in her campaign to procure the public withdrawal of the Report of the Society for Psychical Research,
1885, that condemned Madame Blavatsky as an imposter,
1
ever knew about this unusual and talented
woman.
Privately she elaborated a little more. In a letter to A.E.S. Smythe, General Secretary of The
Theosophical Society in Canada, Mrs. Hastings says of herself: The undersigned joined the Blavatsky
Lodge, London, in 1904, soon drifted out; was literary editor of the New Age, 1908-14, weekly
contributor, 1908-16; found the Mahatma Letters in Switzerland, 1927, studied them ever since; in 1935,
came across the S.P.R. Report, was startled by the gaps in it, began documentation and found that the
facts on record favor H.P.B.
2
Beatrice Hastings was born Emily Alice Haigh on J anuary 26, 1879, in South Hackney, London. Her
mother had come there on a maternity visit from South Africa. In a chronology in Mrs. Hastings
handwriting on the inside cover of her copy of The Letters of H.P. Blavatsky to A.P. Sinnett, she notes
that her family returned to Port Elizabeth in J une or J uly 1879. There she lived until 1883 when she
came back to England with her mother. She stayed in English boarding schools until 1893, when at the
age of fourteen she travelled back to the Cape, only to surface in London at the Blavatsky Lodge, T.S., in
the early 1900s as a rather pretty young woman with short, waved hair, and a new name.
It must have been at one of those Blavatsky Lodge meetings that she met 33-year old Alfred Richard
Orage in 1906. After he became editor the next year of the socialist-oriented New Age, advertised as a
Weekly Review of Politics, Literature, and Art, Mrs. Hastings first piece appeared as a review of one
of Orages own books in the Nov. 30, 1907, issue. Her last piece, signed as Alice Morning, was in
March, 1920. In the period in between she contributed over 200 articles, stories, reviews, poems,
criticism, and letters to the editor, under a series of pseudonyms such as Beatrice Tina, Alice
Morning, Robert Field, and others.
Philip Mairet, in a study on Orage and his journals contribution to English literature, writes of Beatrice
Hastings: She was the one woman who held her place for years among the regular writers of the paper
2
and she did it by sheer force of character and volume of production....She became much more than a
contributor. For a long period she was a strong--perhaps often a determining--influence in conducting the
literary side of the paper; for she worked in the closest collaboration with the editor.
3
Mrs. Hastings
claimed to have introduced writers like Ezra Pound to the public, and his name figures with other well-
known New Age contributors G.B. Shaw, G.K. Chesterton, Arnold Bennett and Katherine Mansfield.
Because of a deteriorating personal relationship with Orage, Mrs. Hastings left for Paris in April, 1914,
to begin a series of letters on life in the French capital. The series ran at first weekly and then
intermittently for the next four years. She was 35 when she arrived in Paris, and she began a new career
as lheroine de plusieurs romans, with her name associated with the painters Modigliani and Picasso,
and the 18-year old writer Raymond Radiguet, who left her for J ean Cocteau. Pierre Sichel, Modiglianis
most exhaustive biographer, believes that Hastings, who soon became popular among the artists of
Montparnasse as la poetesse anglaise, met Modigliani during the summer of 1914, some four months
after her arrival.
4
A number of portraits exist of Mrs. Hastings as a model for the artist from 1915. One of
these is owned by the Art Gallery of Ontario.
The 1920s marked her growing ill-health which stimulated an interest in psychical research. She was
operated for a tumor in 1921, and in 1924 was in the Clinique Petit at Dieppe, suffering from
appendicitis. A photograph by Man Ray from Paris, 1921, shows her still vivacious and defiant, but
another from Dieppe taken three years later, and marked by her very ill, pictures a wan face partially
covered by a dark hat. Apparently her interest in psychical research dates from the time of this illness
when she discovered in 1924 that she had developed the faculty for automatic writing. In 1925 she
travelled to London to have her case tested by Harry Price, Director of the National Laboratory of
Psychical Research. A long account of her experiences is preserved in a 124-page typescript titled The
Picnic of the Babes in the Wood, in the Harry Price Library at the University of London.
After she returned from the continent in 1931, she settled first in London and later in Worthing, Sussex.
Soon involved in a series of new projects, she published a journal for two years, and wrote a booklet of
reminiscences on The Old New Age, Orage, and Others. Early in J uly 1936, she received a letter from
A. Trevor Barker, the editor of The Mahatma Letters to A.P. Sinnett, which was to lead her to a new field
of research.
The London publishers, Williams and Norgate, had just issued a book by two brothers, Harold and
William Loftus Hare, raising the question of Who Wrote the Mahatma Letters? Trevor Barker informed
her, It is some 300 pages, purporting to be a detailed, scholarly and critical survey of the whole of the
Mahatma Letters, and their conclusion of course, is that H.P.B. alone wrote those letters.
5
He suggested
that she write a reply. Her immediate response after receiving the copy he sent her was that this book
amounts to a fraud on the public. At least a third of it is taken without acknowledgment from former
writers. She set off to tabulate the errors, plagiarisms, misquotes, misjuxtapositions, found therein. By
August 10 she had put together a ten-page first list of 221 items that needed correction, almost each
page of the Hare book yielding some error.
Who Wrote the Mahatma Letters? is an odd book made up of summations of the views held by the two
Indian Mahatmas connected with the founding of the Theosophical Movement, their styles of writing,
and personality of these men whom the Hare brothers claimed to be imaginary. It is a relic from an age
when one could boast how little one had read on a subject as a criterion for observation. In his preface,
H. E. Hare tells the reader that aside from the Mahatma Letters, he had perused A.P. Sinnetts two books
based on the letters, The Occult World and Esoteric Buddhism, and the edition of The Early Teachings of
3
the Masters. For background, he had also taken note of a series on the Early History of the Theosophical
Society that The Theosophist began publishing in monthly instalments in 1925.
William Loftus Hare had published compilations on religion and mysticism of the east and west, and had
been a member of the Theosophical Society in England for twenty years, a member of the National
Council of the Society in England, and Vice-President of the London Federation. Described by Annie
Besant as a well-known stirrer-upper of petty quarrels, he had circulated criticisms against the English
General Secretary, Major Graham Pole. In the 1923 English Section election, he offered himself instead.
When he received only one vote, he published an exposure of C.W. Leadbeaters clairvoyant techniques
in the 1923 London Occult Review.
As early as April, 1924, a short review by W.L. Hare of the Mahatma Letters had appeared in the Occult
Review, where he remained non-committal about their status, only stating that the system of the Letters
does not correspond to any doctrine of Indian philosophy known to me. In reading the Letters I cannot
tell whether the authors are Vedantists, Sankhyans, Hinayana or Mahayana Buddhists.
6
By the next year, he claimed to be involved in a critical and scholarly study of the letters, and had
prevailed upon A.P. Sinnetts executrix, Miss Maud Hoffman, to allow him an examination of the
correspondence. In the early autumn of 1925, one evening was devoted to this. In the space of five hours,
from 7 p.m. to almost midnight, the 140 were rapidly gone over, and the size and quality of the paper,
and the colour of ink used on them, was noted as part of the Hares handwriting evidence.
The 32-year old editor of the Letters, A. Trevor Barker, who was present, and who handed each letter to
Mr. Hare, described the experience as one of the most unpleasant recollections of my life, for he found
Hares attitude of playing the detective offensive. You can imagine the feelings of Mr. Sinnetts
Executrix and myself, says Barker, when a few weeks later the London Morning Post began a four-part
series on the Theosophical Societys 50th anniversary as A Shocking J ubilee.
7
The Oct. 31, 1925 issue,
concluding The Frauds of Theosophy, asked and proceeded to answer the question of Who Wrote the
Mahatma Letters? ending with a somewhat out of place call to all well-concerned citizens of the
British Empire to resist what the writer saw to be the incalcuable....social and political evil inherent in
Theosophy.
Far more interesting than anything contained in the Hares 1936 first thorough examination of the
communications alleged to have been received by the late A.P. Sinnett from the Tibetan Mahatmas, was
the Theosophical response to their book. The Canadian Theosophist carried an extended reply in August
by Miss M.A. Thomas, a ULT member in London; and another in October, by Harold Cox, which was
reprinted as a 63-page pamphlet by the H.P.B. Lending Library of Victoria, B.C. The Point Loma
Theosophical Forum carried C.J . Ryans review with corrections in the October, 1936 issue; and even
Dr. de Purucker, the Leader of the Society, got involved, answering a query about the book in the
magazines Question and Answer section. Prof. Ernest Wood panned the book in the September
Theosophist, saying that the Sanskrit criticisms of the authors are practically all and entirely wrong.
while C. J inarajadasa published the text and facsimile of a letter in the K.H. script which was received by
Annie Besant in 1900.
Perhaps the most noteworthy reply was the extended series published in the Washington, D.C., O.E.
Library Critic, from J une-J uly, 1936 to August, 1937. In the space of 12 issues the editor, Dr. H.N.
Stokes, demolished point by point the Hares scholarly facade and arsenal of duds. In the May-J une,
1937 issue, nearing the end of his exhaustive analysis, he summed up their book as a perfect Noahs Ark
4
of misstatements and quibblings and false deductions from false premises. And the series ended with the
news of the appearance of the first volume of Mrs. Hastings Defence of Madame Blavatsky.
It was A. Trevor Barker who encouraged Mrs. Hastings to write the book. He had sent her a postcard on
August 4, 1936, saying, my suggestion is that you consider producing a comprehensive small pamphlet
or brochure which would answer effectively and authoritatively the attacks of the Hares and the different
reviews of their book. By early September she sent him the first section of the intended pamphlet which
dealt with the background of the Mahatma Letters and a note on one of the most difficult issues
connected with the Letters, the so-called Kiddie incident. To complete the material, she told Barker, I
give a short section to the Hares, mainly a list of their errors for the benefit of students. Then I examine a
couple or so of the frauds for the same benefit and returning to the Letters conclude ... I think the first
necessity is to show Theosophists that the case only looks hopeless because they themselves neglect the
records. Also, I am trying to rope in the simple literary folk by drawing attention to the fine writing they
are overlooking.
8
Barker passed Mrs. Hastings manuscript to his friend lona Davey, who had helped him re-edit the
second edition of the Mahatma Letters, and with the manual work involved with its companion volume,
The Letters of H.P. Blavatsky to A.P. Sinnett. Trevor Barker was happy to report that she is enthusiastic
and thinks it will exactly meet the necessities of the case.
9
Mrs. Davey held the position of Hon.
Secretary of the Blavatsky Association, a group started in 1923 out of the interest generated by Mrs.
Alice Cleathers books and the Back to Blavatsky movement. The Association had done some good work
publishing a Blavatsky Bibliography in 1933, and was responsible for the insertion of a fairer appraisal of
Mme. Blavatsky in the 1929 Encyclopedia Britannica.
Mrs. Hastings manuscript was sent to Rider and Company of London, the publishers of the Mahatma
Letters, on Barkers enthusiastic recommendation, but the first reader had given it an unfavourable
report, and the company had asked for a guarantee. She decided the book could be printed privately and
asked Barker to collect ten pounds sterling toward this, when he replied that he would not help with any
money unless he had the supervision. This proved the final insult to cap a long series of pinpricks that
led to the first of many rows between them, so she went on alone and issued it from The Hastings Press
in Worthing late in April, 1937.
10
Her 60-page Volume I of the Defence of Madame Blavatsky, dealing with the pros and cons of the
Mahatma Letters was well received by the Theosophical press. Stokes, in the J uly, 1937 O.E. Library
Critic, found Mrs. Hastings presentation concise, pungent, and at times sarcastic. I thought I had
sucked all the juice out of the Hare lemon, but I deceived myself ... In the space of 19 pages (pp. 37-55)
Mrs. Hastings picks the Hares to bits; she pulls off the feathers, flays them, peels off the flesh, removes
the viscera and finally pulverizes the skeleton. One regrets that she could not devote the entire volume to
her irate fireworks.
To raise support for the other volumes of the Defence series, Mrs. Hastings started a small review, New
Universe, the first issue of which appeared in J uly, 1937. Ranging from 16 to 26 pages, the six numbers
she edited till J anuary, 1939, dealt with some of the knotty points raised by critics. In response, Miss
Marjorie Debenham, of St. J ohns Wood, sent 25 pounds towards the printing of Volume II. Mrs. Alice
Cleather, an old pupil of H.P.B.s, sent 5 pounds from Darjeeling, India. Mrs. H. Henderson sent 10
pounds and ordered 50 copies for the H.P.B. Lending Library of Victoria, British Columbia.
The second volume of the Defence was sent to the printer in August, but did not come out until October.
5
Dealing with Emma Coulombs 1885 pamphlet confessing confederacy with H.P.B., this booklet is
perhaps Mrs. Hastings most coherent and cohesive work. She handles changes which are at the very crux
of the question of the legitimacy of H.P.B.s phenomena. By placing twelve of the supposed letters
attributed to H.P.B. against what is actually known of the outcome of the situations described, she shows
that Madame Coulombs account does not stand up to the facts. A third volume dealing with the so-called
Shrine, the cabinet where phenomena occurred at Adyar, and a fourth on V.S. Solovyovs account, A
Modern Priestess of Isis, were announced.
In J anuary, 1938, a public society, The Friends of Madame Blavatsky, was formed to agitate for the
defence of H.P.B. By March, there were members in 15 countries. The J uly, 1938, issue of New Universe
contained the first list of over two hundred members, including some of the most prominent names
connected with the case for Mme. Blavatsky. Among the F.M.B. members were: J ohn Watkins, London;
R.A.V. Morris, Hove, Sussex; B.P. Wadia, Bombay; Abbott Clark, H.T. Edge, Boris de Zirkoff, of Point
Loma, California; Mrs. Alice Cleather and Basil Crump, in Darjeeling; Albert Smythe, and his son
Connie, of Toronto; Christmas Humphreys and his wife; Dr. H.N. Stokes; and of course, Trevor Barker,
Mrs. Iona Davey and her friend Miss Marjorie Debenham.
The function of the Friends of Madame Blavatsky was outlined in a two-page leaflet, some twenty
thousand of which were printed and rapidly circulated: Everyone who believes an injustice has been
done to Madame Blavatsky by the Report of the Society for Psychical Research is welcome among the
Friends. No other belief but that is required of anyone, neither are we connected in any way with any
other Society under the sun. The aim of the Friends of Madame Blavatsky is to bring pressure on the
Society for Psychical Research to withdraw their Report that denounced her as an imposter.
A London headquarters, two rooms at 94 Ladbroke Grove, was opened in J une, 1938, staffed by Mrs.
Hastings herself on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. On September 22, a successful evening lecture by Prince
Melikoff on Tiflis and the Caucasus in the time of Madame Blavatsky was organized. But, as Mrs.
Hastings notes, all this was much too successful, and the devil had to get busy.
11
One female member,
whom Mrs. Hastings describes as free, stout, about 40 or 45 years of age, quarrelled with her, and then
circulated letters to prominent Theosophists complaining of her management of the group. Another, who
performed occasional secretarial work, wanted her to take more rooms at 94 Ladbroke Grove where he
could live; when she declined, he pitched into her.
Her confrontation with Mrs. Davey, Miss Debenham and Barker, on the running of the F.M.B. developed
into a wrangle which smashed the effort. On Tuesday, J uly 26, 1938, Miss Debenham, who had
guaranteed the rent on the F.M.B. rooms at 94 Ladbroke Grove, made a special visit there. Mrs. Hastings
notes of their meeting, Came. She and Mrs. Davey had meetings over the phone and decided to tell me
what to do give up 94 and hand over funds to a Treasurer (someone more fitted than myself to spend
the money!!!) Not said but what other conclusion?
12
The matter was not pursued, but when the 59-year
old Mrs. Hastings took an interest in British politics later that year, speaking at Trafalgar Square on the
recent Munich crisis, and publishing a four-page journal, The Democrat, from the 94 Ladbroke Grove
address, this encouraged Mrs. Davey and her friends to have the F.M.B. audited.
Another visit from Miss Debenham precipitated a long letter from Mrs. Hastings presenting her position.
The situation resolves itself into something like this: 1. None of you apparently can comprehend or
believe that a person can do anything for nothing: that is, nothing of the vulgar sort, a reward in money or
notoriety, or both. 2. You were all at first unwarily enchanted to find someone capable of lifting the
stigma from you as followers of Theosophy. 3. You became subconsciously or even consciously annoyed
6
at its being done by an outsider.
4. Nos. 1 and 3 linked. And No. 1 grew and dominated and gave you vulgar ground for attacks on me,
but yet, you wanted me to go on and finish. This, fortified by your own superficial interpretation of
reincarnation and karma in which I have stated I do not concur; for, seeing that I have not even that as a
hope or a fear what can be my motives in undertaking this defence of Madame Blavatsky? Nothing is
left for you to think but that I must be aiming at money and notoriety or both. To the latter, reply is
needless for me. I have almost always written anonymously and I have nothing to gain but something to
risk by being identified, however erroneously, with the T.S.
So 5: You get together and decide to put me on the stand. I am not going to retail what I have done.
The public part of it is there for everyone to see. The private part you may reflect on if you choose by
rereading my letters to you all right from the beginning with my reply to Barkers letter to me about
the Hare book, which started me along the path where I have had shock after shock at the extraordinary,
incredible selfishness, greed and cruelty of Theosophists.
13
The audited accounts of the Friends of Madame Blavatsky, as published in the May 15, 1939 issue of The
Canadian Theosophist, showed that the group actually owed Mrs. Hastings some 20 pounds that she had
put out of pocket. After this debacle her correspondence with the London Theosophists ends. But she was
not given up on entirely. H.N. Stokes, editor of the Critic, wrote her on Oct. 17: It is a long time since I
have heard anything from you and as I do not know what your intentions are, it has been impossible for
me to make any reference to your work in recent issues of the Critic. Perhaps you have given it up
entirely to go into war activities for which I would not in the least blame you. At the same time I should
like very much to know just how matters stand as I want to give you what support I can and do not want
to be considered forgetful when I do not give information which I do not possess. A.E.S. Smythe, Editor
of The Canadian Theosophist, wrote her similarly on Oct. 21: I am rather alarmed about not hearing
from you, if you have not the energy or interest of a postcard to give us something to keep your name and
cause before our readers.
She replied to Stokes on November 9: I am doing nothing. There is nothing to do. With hundreds of the
first two vols. on my hands, a third is not a business proposition anyway. It would cost at least a hundred
pounds to print (more; since the war, paper has gone up 50%, labour too gone up). Further, I shall never
again work for nothing. People dont appreciate it and of course thats the old newspaper truth. I only
carried on because I was wildly enthusiastic. Shock after shock has cured me of that. A longer letter in a
toned-down vein was sent to the Editor of The Canadian Theosophist two days later and was printed on
the front page of the Dec. 15, 1939 issue. At present, I am doing nothing but hold on and wait ... The
first work for the F.M.B. is to get the books I have written distributed so that people can read them, then
we can talk about more.
A further letter of hers was published in the Oct. 15, 1940 issue, correcting some statements of P.G.
Bowen on the work of the F.M.B. In 1943 the rough manuscript of her proposed volume III of the
Defence series was sent to Smythe to print serially. My only stipulation, she told him, is that nothing
must be altered, omitted or added in the text of my book.
14
Mrs. Hastings critical analysis of the book
A Modern Priestess of Isis ran through eight monthly instalments in The Canadian Theosophist, from
J uly 15, 1943 to Feb. 15, 1944, filling some 64 pages as Solovyoffs Fraud.
* * *
7
Vsevolod Sergeevich Solovyovs 1895 book, A Modern Priestess of Isis, was probably the most
damaging portrayal of Mme. Blavatsky to be published in English in the decade after her death. This
Russian writer had met her briefly in Paris in 1884 on her European visit, and again in 1885 after her
return to the continent. Solovyov (1849-1903), who specialized in historical novels on Russian themes, is
now totally forgotten, obscured by his better known brother, the philosopher Vladimir Sergeevich
Solovyov (1853-1900).
A Modern Priestess of lsis (Sovremennaia Zhritsa Izidy), Vsevolod Sergeevichs only work translated
into English, initially appeared as eight articles in the 1892 Russian Messenger (Russki Vestnik), and
was published in book form in St. Petersburg the next year. It was written, the author says, to counteract
(and capitalize) on the interest generated by a long biographical sketch from H.P.B.s sister, Vera
Zhelihovsky, in the Russian Review (Russkoye Obozreniye) in 1891, which, translated, appeared in
Lucifer Nov. 1894 to April 1895.
As abridged and translated on behalf of the Society for Psychical Research by Walter Leaf, the edition
put out by Longmans, Green and Company, London, in 1895, is a complex document. Chapters I to XXV
are a rambling account of Solovyovs European encounter with Madame Blavatsky, replete with their
conversations from a decade before, and culminating in her long letter to him titled My Confession.
Chapter XXVI to XXIX attempt to recount the origin of the Theosophical Society based on H.P.B.s
letters from New York to the Russian editor, A.N. Aksakov. An abstract of Mme. Zhelihovskys reply,
H.P. Blavatsky and a Modern Priest of Truth, forms a 35-page Appendix A; this is followed with
Solovyovs rejoinder in 31 pages as Appendix B. As if this is not enough, a further assault is made in an
Appendix C by William Emmette Coleman, one of H.P.B.s most virulent critics, claiming plagiarism as
the Sources of Madame Blavatskys Writings.
Solovyov, who was in Paris in the spring of 1884 gathering material at the Bibliotheque Nationale for a
novel, heard of H.P.B.s arrival in the Paris press which was full of the sparkling receptions held for her
by the Duchesse de Pomar in the Faubourg St. Germain. At the time, she was known to him only for her
Russian writings, the popular series, From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan, under her pen-name of
RaddaBai. He gained an introduction, and according to his letters in Mme. Zhelihovskys appendix,
pestered Mme. Blavatsky to be put on the path of occultism. He was rewarded by an astral visitation by
Mahatma M., which he later credited to a case of bad nerves, and after which, H.P.B. says, having had a
good look at him Master would have nothing more to do with him.
15
Although he later claimed that he was playing the role of the docile inquirer, Solovyovs name appears in
a number of letters to the press testifying to the validity of Theosophical phenomena. The publication of
Richard Hodgsons damning report of H.P.B. in the December 1885 Proceedings of the Society for
Psychical Research, and the attendant ridicule it brought to the adherents of Theosophy, must have
caused him to reconsider his position, for his attitude toward her radically changed.
Solovyov has turned against me like a mad dog, H.P.B. informed the President of the London Lodge,
A.P. Sinnett, early in February, 1886.
16
Her aunt, Mme. de Fadeyev, had found out that his wife who
had accompanied him was actually his unmarried sister-in-law, his other wifes sister, that he seduced
when she was only thirteen
17
and had written to Vera that this wife was no fit company for her
daughters. Vera showed this letter to Solovyov who in turn responded with one threatening H.P.B. with
the news that General Blavatsky, her first husband, whom you (H.P.B.) have prematurely buried, was
still alive, making her a bigamist.
8
H.P.B.s reply, headed My Confession, is the highpoint of his narrative. While Vera Zhelihovsky has
charged him with manipulating certain passages in this letter it can be regarded on the whole, even in
translation, as a representation of Mme. Blavatskys feelings. Her statement begins with an allegory, a
fragment of which she quotes in a letter to Sinnett on Feb. 7, 1886: Did you ever picture to yourself an
innocent, harmless boar, who asked only to be left quietly to live in his forest, who had never hurt a man,
and against whom a pack of hounds is let loose to turn out of that wood and tear him to pieces?
18
One by
one the wild animals who were his friends join his attackers, and when the boar sees his beloved forest
on fire and beyond saving, he turns on the pack, and then woe to the latter.
I will snatch the weapon from my enemies hands and write a book which will resound through all
Europe and Asia, she replied to Solovyov. In this book I shall simply say: In 1848, I, hating my
husband, N.V. Blavatsky (it may have been wrong, but still such was the nature God gave me), left him,
abandoned him a virgin (I shall produce documents and a letter proving this; and he himself is not
such a swine as to deny it). I loved one man deeply, but I loved occult science still more, believing in
magic, enchantments, etc.... I will even take to lies, to the greatest of lies, which for that reason is
the most likely of all to be believed. I will say and publish it in the Times and in all the papers, that the
Master and Mahatma K. H. are only the product of my own imagination: that I invented them ... And
to this I have been brought by YOU. You have been the last straw which has broken the camels back
under its intolerably heavy burden.
19
Not much of a confession by any standard, but Solovyov manipulated fragments he translated into French
for members of the Paris branch, making it seem much more damaging. Although he had the audacity to
write her back, If you compare yourself to a wild boar, and want to bite, very well, the traps are laid,
20
he did nothing, but waited until she was dead and truly powerless, and then he struck. His explanation
that he was only correcting the false impression given by Mme. Zhelihovskys 1891 review of her sisters
life, is flawed, for she had also issued a far more important sketch, The Truth About Mme. Blavatsky,
for the St. Petersburg journal Rebus, in 1883, which was issued as a pamphlet around the time of his
initial break with the Theosophists.
Since much of his narrative and Mme. Blavatskys admissions are reported in the form of their
conversation, we have only Solovyovs word for much of what he gives, but when he attempts to
reconstruct the events that led to the founding of the Theosophical Society based on some early letters of
H.P.B.s to Alexander Aksakov, his blunders can be checked. An example of his slanting evidence is
shown on page 253 of the book where, after quoting a long letter from H.P.B. dated May 24, 1875, he
gives as his own brief summation her motive for starting the Society: Here, you see, is my trouble,
tomorrow there will be nothing to eat. Something quite out of the way must be invented. Worked into
his text these words, contrary to the events, leave the impression of being H.P.B.s, and have been quoted
with the complacency of subsequent biographers as if they were.
Mrs. Hastings treatment of Solovyovs story remains, like her volume on Mme. Coulombs pamphlet,
the only study devoted solely to refuting the authors charges. Her handling is ingenious, and by sifting
through the charges and countercharges that circulate in the pages of A Modern Priestess of Isis, she
reconstructs what actually occurred the plain tale verified by documents, dates and chronology,
from Solovyovs perverted tale which belongs to fiction. Her Defence volume on Solovyov was
initially advertised to follow one that dealt with the Shrine at Adyar and Hodgsons 1885 report on it,
but she had come to believe that the demolition of Solovyovs account should take precedence. Unlike
Hodgsons Report, for which the Society for Psychical Research had repeatedly disclaimed
responsibility, this book carried a prefatory note by the Founder-President, Henry Sidgwick, who was
9
authorized by the Council of the Society for Psychical Research to state formally on their behalf that the
present translation of Mr. Solovyovs A Modern Priestess of Isis has been made and published with their
approval.
21
Mr. Solovyovs entertaining narrative would make an Important supplement to the
S.P.R. Committees 1885 Report.
This crucial work was the last of her many writings that Beatrice Hastings saw through the press. The
Dec. 15, 1943 number of The Canadian Theosophist carried a black-bordered notice on page 312 that she
passed away peacefully on Oct. 30. She had suffered from ill-health for some time: a copy of Raphaels
Ephemeris in which she made marginal notes has next to the date of 8 Nov. 1941, getting ill.
The J an. 15, 1944 issue of the C.T. contained an expanded notice of Mrs. Hastings death. According to
the inquest, quoted from the Worthing Gazette of Oct. 31, 1943, the coroner returned a verdict of suicide
while the deceased was mentally unhinged. Medical evidence was that the deceased must have suffered
considerable pain for a long period of time, from the condition of the internal organs.
Miss Doris Lilian Green, who occasionally acted in a secretarial capacity for Mrs. Hastings, and who
became the executrix of her estate, wrote me, correcting part of Smythes obituary, that her passing was
peaceful even if she hastened the end herself not in the kitchen but in the room she used as a bed-
sitting room. She took a pillow of eiderdown and seated herself comfortably on the floor and turned on
the gas-fire tap. A Mrs. Nolan, who was attending her then, found her ... I dont think she had cancer
tho she believed she had, and certainly did suffer acutely from the gastro-enteritis, or whatever it was.
22
One of her last tasks was to indicate that her library of books, pamphlets and typed papers that she had
built up during her Defence of Madame Blavatsky campaign be sent to A. E.S. Smythe, and this was done
after the War.
Beatrice Hastings brought a new impetus to the field of Theosophical research, and in the decades
following her death, her insistence on thorough documentation proved a marked influence on other
writers. K.F. Vania issued his 1951 study, Madame H.P. Blavatsky, Her Occult Phenomena and the
Society for Psychical Research, as a fulfilment of her intention to deal with Hodgsons 1885 Report. Mr.
Vania referred to her as my worthy and illustrious predecessor in his preface, acknowledging that her
work has always been a fount of inspiration to the present writer. A selection of her annotated books,
pamphlets and unpublished notes on the Shrine Room at Adyar, was loaned for some years to Walter
Carrithers, the author of Obituary: The Hodgson Report on Madame Blavatsky, 1963. He believes that
her work was probably as much inspiration as rationalization.
Her work provides a sharp demarcation with the studies of the Blavatsky case that had preceded hers
William Kingslands 1927 analysis of the Hodgson Report, which he undertook for the Blavatsky
Association; and Annie Besants 1907 summation of the testimony of the Theosophists in this case.
While they approached the subject with great reluctance and distaste, as admitted by Kingsland, Mrs.
Hastings entered on her work with a certain gusto. She tracked down as much of the original literature as
possible, including old pamphlets and reports. Some came from the London bookseller, J ohn Watkins:
other volumes were loaned from William Kingslands library. She even made a special visit to R.A.V.
Morris of Hove, Sussex, whom Barker had told her had every magazine and book he can lay his hands
on. What she could not get, she had typed copies made.
She follows a line of action indicated by

H.P.B. herself in a letter to Sinnett, where she says, Show
systematically the unheard of persecutions, conspiracies, even the mistakes made, and that will be our
justification.
23
As Mrs. Hastings informed one of her F.M.B. members, We have to prove first, not that
10
1. Prospectus for The Friends of Madame Blavatsky, London, 1938.
2. Hastings to Smythe, Dec. 5, 1936, Worthing, England. Archives of The Theosophical Society in Canada.
3. P. Mairet, A. R. Orage (London: J .M. Dent and Sons, 1936), p. 47.
4. P. Sichel, Modigliani (New York: E.P. Dutton and Company, 1967), p. 264.
5. Barker to Hastings, 6 J uly 1936, London. Hastings Collection, H.P.B. Lending Library, Vernon, British Columbia.
6. W.L. Hare, Occult Review, London (April, 1924), p. 424.
7. Barker to A.E.S. Smythe, J une 22,1937, published partially in The Canadian Theosophist (August 15, 1937), pp. 172-3.
8. Hastings to Barker, Sept. 6, 1936, Worthing. Hastings Collection.
9. Barker to Hastings, Sept. 29, 1936, London. Hastings Collection.
10. Hastings to Iona Davey, Dec. 14, 1936, Worthing. Hastings Collection.
11. Hastings, in The Canadian Theosophist (May 15, 1939), p. 87. The Same Old Story.
the phenomena were occult, but that they could not have been done in the fraudulent manner alleged;
and the Masters can at best only be taken for granted, as it were, as I take them myself in my writings, not
insisting until HPB herself is cleared, for she is their witness. The same applies to the other witnesses,
Olcott, Damodar and others: we must clear them first. And we CAN!
24
Mrs. Hastings must have hit the quiet London community of Theosophists, especially around A. Trevor
Barker and the Hon. Iona Davey, like a meteorite. Described to me as a set of crusty old tories by
someone who knew this group, Mrs. Hastings bohemian attitude, her constant smoking Du Mauriers red
label cigarettes, and her other idiosyncrasies, would have inevitably proved a friction. There was also the
physical and psychic pressures of the War, and the deteriorating condition of A. Trevor Barker. Mrs.
Elsie Benjamin, secretary to Dr. de Purucker, leader of the Point Loma Theosophical Society, who came
to England in 1937 and met Barker, the President of their English Section, wrote me that all during that
time Trevor was a very ill man, and his illness particularly taking the form of deep depression and
excessive fatigue, which would be bound to colour his correspondence and outlook.
25
In the end, Beatrice Hastings association with Theosophists proved fatal, for recent biographies, whether
they be on members of the Paris art scene during the First War, or of Londons literary underworld as
Virginia Woolf called them, use this connection to detract from her contribution. After admitting her
influence on the artist Modigliani, his biographer, Pierre Sichel, dismisses her as having ended with a
crew of bogus amateur Theosophists who hung on her words.
26
She was enough of a woman of the
literary world to know this would happen but she continued on her Defence campaign. Early in her
correspondence with A. Trevor Barker she wrote him, I do this work because I wish to leave the record
behind me... It will bring me neither kudos nor, probably money ... The literary world will think me a fool
to spend my time on H.P.B. and several lukewarm enemies will become real ones ... As for
Theosophists...after reading the stupid articles on the Hare book, I very much doubt whether the writers
would indeed welcome an outsider who puts them all to shame from the only tribune that matters a damn
in this case, the documentary.
27
________________________
11
12. Note by Mrs. Hastings on the back of M. Debenhams postal card of J uly 25, 1938, announcing her visit the next day.
Hastings Collection.
13. Hastings to Marjorie Debenham, J an. 6, 1939, Worthing. Hastings Collection.
14. Hastings to A.E.S. Smythe, April 29, 1943, Worthing. Archives of The Theosophical Society in Canada.
15. H.P.B. to A.P. Sinnett (late Feb./early Mar., 1886, Wurzburg), Letter LXXIX, in The Letters of H.P. Blavatsky to A.P.
Sinnett (LBS), p. 192.
16. H.P.B. to Sinnett, (early February, 1886), Letter LXXII, LBS, p. 175.
17. H.P.B. to Sinnett (Mar. 3, 1886), Letter LXXX, LBS. p. 192.
18. H.P.B. to Sinnett (Feb. 7, 1886), Letter LXXVI, LBS, p. 179.
19. H.P.B. to V.S. Solovyov (dated by Mrs. Hastings as about Feb. 13, '86, or earlier, probably 8 or 9), A Modern Priestess of
Isis (MPI) London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1895; reprinted, New York; Arno Press, 1976, pp. 176-81.
A note on spelling: the translator of his book, and Mrs. Hastings, follow the old spelling, Solovyoff; I prefer an -iov ending as it
gives the reader a better guide to pronunciation, but Cambridge University Press uses the more traditional Solovyov for the entry
on his brother in Nineteenth Century Religious Thought in the West, 2,1985. I have decided to use the -yov ending. If the reader
tries to follow up material on himthere would probably be more under this spelling.
20. V.S. Solovyov to Blavatsky (Hastings date: about Feb. 13, '86), MPI, p. 317.
21. Henry Sidgwick, MPI, p. iii.
22. Doris Lilian Green to myself, Sept. 1971. Mrs.Hastings collection of books and pamphlets left to Smythe went to the H.P.B.
Lending Library in British Columbia shortly before his death in 1947.
23. H.P.B. to Sinnett (after 13 April, 1886), Letter LX, LBS, p. 147.
24. Hastings to C.W.F. Bellgrove of Melbourne, Australia, March 30, 1938, Worthings. Hastings Collection.
25. Elsie Benjamin (nee Savage) to myself, 7 April, 1971, Worthing, England.
26. P. Sichel, Modigliani, p. 305.
27. Hastings to Barker, Nov. 17, 1936, Worthing. Hastings Collection.
12
SOLOVYOFFS FRAUD
Being a critical analysis of the book A Modern Priestess of Isis
translated from the Russian of Vsevolod S. Solovyoff by Walter Leaf.
By BEATRICE HASTINGS
NOTE
Perhaps the most difficult task for a critic would be to analyze a semi-auto-biographical book by a man
who had been born sane and become a lunatic; and next, a book by a man who deliberately did what the
lunatic would do unconsciously, namely, juggle with a mixture of truth and falsehood. At first sight, the
thing reads true, being connected with real persons places and circumstances; one may feel that there are
gaps, but only close examination by the light of some related evidence will reveal the gaps and, also, the
flimsy stuff used to hide them. The new evidence is usually some suppressed document, and then dates
come into play and presently the whole thing falls to pieces. The position of a person accused by one of
these juggling scoundrels must be hopeless unless the person happens to possess, or to come into
possession of, vital documents and can pull the charge up on dates. Time and freedom to search are the
necessary factors and our expeditious legal justice must have expedited many an innocent under the
gallows who might have cleared himself if given the time. Circumstantial evidence should condemn no-
one.
In the case of Madame Blavatsky, accused by Solovyoff, the documents proving Solovyoff a liar and so
debased that he was willing to accuse himself falsely of feigning sympathy during nearly two years in
order to trap and destroy morally a friend the documents were in existence and were preserved, to be
produced and to clarify the Plain Tale. He thought himself safe when he wrote his book. Madame
J elihovsky, the sister of H.P.B., had burned all, as she fancied, of H.P.B.s Russian correspondence. But
Madame Blavatsky had sent to Colonel Olcott part of her correspondence with Solovyoff, and Olcott
produced these letters when Mme. J . entered into a fight with Solovyoff for her sisters memory. The
letters are conclusive in substance, tone and date.
They show Solovyoff as an ambitious aspirant to occult knowledge and powers, ready to believe himself
fitted to lead the Society along with H.P.B., if only she would trust him, despising all the other
Theosophists; and a lively chapter might be written on his jealousy of Olcott, Sinnett, Hartmann and
anyone who seemed to enjoy Madame Blavatskys confidence. His fury at being rejected is at the bottom
of his book, a personal disappointment exasperated by the fear that men like Richet and Myers might be
smiling at his defeat since they knew that he had actually sent in his resignation to the S.P.R. and
championed Blavatsky. Richet and Myers, however, had themselves something to cover up in this
respect, especially Myers, and they received back with open arms their companion in misadventure,
accepting from him what was their own excuse for visiting Madame Blavatsky, namely, scientific duty to
research even when one suspects imposture. I say excuse, for they ran away with such a scurry as to
measure very perfectly their primitive interest, even enthusiasm. Professor Richet visited Madame.
Blavatsky four times in the spring, 1884, and so late as Oct. 8th, 1885, and after the S. P. R. had
published Hodgsons first report in J uly, he was still open to conviction. Such an attitude is, of course,
13
commendable; where Richet failed was in accepting finally what was nothing but a police report in place
of a scientific investigation. The neurotic Solovyoff came in as a handy paratonerre for these men of
wide reputation and no doubt their coddling flattery sent him far along the road where he ends for
posterity as a criminal liar and traitor, even to himself.
It soon becomes clear to the critic that there are really two books in this book: one, Solovyoffs first true
impressions, and the other, falsehoods worked in later to condemn Madame Blavatsky. I should judge
that he wrote the book originally some time during his frequentation of her and meant it to be Ye
Historie and Magnification of Saint Solovyoff, Mystic and Occultist. The magnification having failed to
come off, he turned the book into a denunciation of Madame Blavatsky and himself into a scientific
researcher and a saviour of Christian Russia from the miasmic exhalations of Theosophy.
I cannot here undertake to reproduce all the data I have gathered to refute the misstatements and lies in
Sololyoffs book; my margins are marked from cover to cover and a volume twice this size would
scarcely suffice to deal with the matter in detail. I propose, therefore, to take the chapters in order and
make from them two books, one The Plain Tale and the second, The Plain Tale as Perverted by
Sololyoff. I will examine them at length or briefly according to their importance. In a prefatory note to
the book, Professor Henry Sidgwick of the S.P.R. writes: When the contents of Mr. Solovyoffs book
became known to the Council, it seemed clear that certain portions of it especially the accounts of the
events at Wurzburg described in chaps. xviii-xx . . . constituted an important supplement to the statement
of the results of an inquiry into Theosophical phenomena carried out by a Committee of the Society in
1884. Our original idea was to publish a translation of these portions in the supplement to our
Proceedings: but on further consideration it seemed to us clearly desirable, if possible that the greater
part of Mr. Solovyoffs entertaining narrative should be made accessible to English readers.
We all, all who believe that justice is more than a word, are indebted to the S.P.R. for making the book
accessible, although one might be excused from sharing the frivolous glee of Sidgwick the medium-
hunter at adding yet another victim to his list. It happens that the chapters noted by the learned Professor
are just those that suit me entirely and I shall spend some space on them, offering in advance to the
present members of the S.P.R. my condolences.
THE PLAIN TALE
As told by Solovyoff himself, by letters and documents, all being printed in his book, A Modern
Priestess of Isis, translated by Walter Leaf on behalf of The Society for Psychical Research and
published by Longmens, 1895.
CHAPTER I.
In May 1884, I was living in Paris, and planning some works, bellettristic or otherwise, which should
touch on certain little-known subjects; on the rare, but in my opinion real, manifestations of the
imperfectly investigated spiritual powers of man. I was occupied, among other things, with mystic and
so-called occultist literature.
As I was going through my notes from the Bibliotheque Nationale, there came into my mind the very
interesting narratives of Radda Bai, in other words of Madame Blavatsky, published in the Russky
Vyestnik under the title of From the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan, which had been read with so much
interest in Russia. The subject of my studies was closely connected with the essential motive of these
narratives.
14
Should I not make up my mind in earnest? I thought. Should I not start for India, to see our wonderful
country woman, Madame Blavatsky, and convince myself in person as to how far the marvels of which
she speaks are in accordance with fact?
J ust at this time a friend showed me a copy of the Matin, and there, among the news of the day, was an
announcement that the famous foundress of the Theosophical Society, H. P. Blavatsky, was in Europe;
that a day or two before she had arrived in Paris from Nice; that she had settled in Rue Notre Dame des
Champs, and would there receive anyone who was interested in the theosophical movement that she had
set on foot. (p. 10.)
I immediately wrote to St. Petersburg to Mr. P., who, I knew, was in correspondence with Madame
Blavatsky. I begged him to acquaint her at once with the fact that a certain resident in Paris would like to
make her acquaintance, but would not do so until he had first received her consent.
A few days after, much sooner than I could have expected, I received an answer from St. Petersburg,
informing me that H. P. Blavatsky expected me and would receive me whenever I liked.
It was not without some emotion that I went to the Rue Notre Dame des Champs, selecting an hour that I
thought would be the most suitable, not too early and not very late. During the time while I was awaiting
my reply from St. Petersburg, I had quite electrified myself with the idea of the interesting acquaintance
that I was about to make.
Though I had not in my possession the Caves and Jungles of Hindostan I remembered it from beginning
to end, and felt all the fascination of this skilful narrative, that combines realism with the most wonderful
mystery . .
The coachman stopped at the number I had told him . . In answer to my inquiry the concierge showed
me the way . . A figure in an Oriental turban admitted me . . . . To my question, whether Madame
Blavatsky would receive me, the figure replied with an Entrez, monsieur, and vanished with my card . . .
The door opened, and she was before me; a rather tall woman, though she produced the impression of
being short, on account of her unusual stoutness. Her great head seemed all the greater from her thick and
very bright hair, touched with a scarcely perceptible grey, and very slightly frizzed, by nature, and not by
art, as I subsequently convinced myself.
At the first moment, her plain old earthy-coloured face struck me as repulsive; but she fixed on me the
gaze of her great . . eyes, and in these wonderful eyes, with their hidden power, all the rest was forgotten.
I remarked however that she was very strangely dressed in a sort of black sacque ..
She received me so simply, affectionately and kindly, it was so pleasant to me to hear her Russian talk
that . .
At the end of a quarter of an hour, I was talking to, Helena Petrovna as though she were an old friend,
and all her homely coarse appearance actually began to please me. And her eyes gazed at me so
graciously, and at the same time pierced me so attentively.
15
I explained to her that it was not mere idle curiosity that had brought me to her; that I was busied with
mystic and occult literature, and had come for an answer to many questions of the greatest seriousness
and importance to myself.
Whatever it was that brought you to me, she said. I am exceedingly glad to make your acquaintance
you see I am a Russian and if you come on serious matters besides, you may be sure that I shall be
entirely at your service. Where I can, I will help you with delight.
As she spoke, she laughed a good-humoured kindly laugh.
You will have to begin at the A B C, Helena Petrovna. All I know about yourself and your society is
what you have yourself published in the Russky Vyestnik.
Well, my little father, she went on, since that day, much water has flowed down. At that time, our
society was scarcely hatched from its egg; but now!
Then she began eagerly to tell me of the successes of the theosophical movement in America and India,
and, in the immediate past, in Europe as well.
Are you here for long? I asked.
I do not know myself yet; the master sent me.
What master?
My master, the teacher, my Guru; you may call him Gulab Lal Singh, from the Caves and Jungles of
Hindostan.
I remembered this Gulab Lal Singh in every detail; the mysterious being . . a being who had attained the
highest degree of human knowledge and produced the most marvellous phenomena . . . .
Helena Petrovna spoke of this master of hers with entire simplicity, as though of a most ordinary
phenomenon . . . .
Helena Petrovna, I said, listen to me, and if you have the power of gazing into a man and seeing him
as he really is, you may convince yourself how far my words are serious. I come to you in all honesty,
without any mental reservations, with a great spiritual problem; I come to you to obtain the fulfilment of
what you promise, of the allurements you hold out in your Caves and Jungles of Hindostan. If you can
answer this my spiritual question seriously, promise me to do so; if you cannot, or will not, it shall be all
the same, we will remain friends, as fellow-countrymen and brothers of the pen . . .
She did not answer me at once, but gazed into my eyes enigmatically and long with her bright magnetic
gaze, and then solemnly said, I can, and stretched me out her hand . . .
Now my good fellow-countryman . . . Listen.
16
She made a sort of flourish with her hand, raised it upwards, and suddenly I heard , distinctly, quite
distinctly, somewhere above our heads, near the ceiling, a very melodious sound like a little silver bell or
an Eolian harp.
What is the meaning of this? I asked.
This means only that my master is here, although you and I cannot see him. He tells me . . that I am to
do for you whatever I can.. . .
She looked me straight in the eyes, and caressed me with her glance and her kindly smile. So there, sir.
Involuntarily I liked her more and more. I was attracted to her by a feeling of instantaneous sympathy . . .
Do you speak English? she asked me.
Unfortunately, no. I once took lessons in the language, but now I have almost forgotten it.
What a pity! Well, we must get on without it somehow, and you can set about learning it.
Yes, certainly.. . .
Stay, I will introduce you at once to Mohini, a young Brahmin who has come here with me, said Helena
Petrovna. He is a chela, a disciple of another Mahatma . . . an ascetic sage like my master, but much
more communicative.
Mohini, she cried; and in a moment, the door of the next room opened, and gave admission to a rather
strange young man. From his appearance he seemed to be not more than twenty-five to twenty-seven
years of age. His figure, that was narrow-shouldered and not tall, was clad in a cashmere cassock; his
thick blue-black wavy hair fell to his shoulders. The upper part of his bronze face was strikingly
handsomea wise forehead, not very high, straight eyebrows, not too thick, and most magnificant [sic]
velvety eyes with a deep and velvety expression . . .
Madame Blavatsky raised her hand, and Mohini bowed himself to the earth . . . as though to receive her
blessing. She laid her hand upon his head, he raised himself and bowed to me with the greatest courtesy
. . . . (p. 11 et seq.)
[Madame Blavatsky explains that CHELAS never shake hands. Solovyoff leaves Mohini
standing looking now at me and now at Helena Petrovna. . . Presumably, Mohini
retired, for a lengthy conversation goes on in Russian, Madame Blavatsky explaining to
Solovyoff the aims and ideals of the Theosophical Society. First of all you must know
that the aim of our universal brotherhood is perfectly devoid of any political character,
and that the society in no way interferes with the religious or other convictions of its
members. Our problems are purely scientific, we bring back from darkness and oblivion
the mighty and ancient doctrines of the East.]
. . . and from her words it appeared to be a really beneficent and intensely interesting institution. The
17
inexhaustible treasure of ancient doctrines, hitherto jealously guarded in the mysterious sanctuaries of
India by the sage Raj-Yogis, and completely unknown to the civilized world, was now, thanks to her
communications with the Mahatmas and their confidence in her, being revealed to Europeans. The world
was to be renovated by the true knowledge of the forces of nature. . .
I had remained too long already, and so took my leave.
Now you will come again? When?
When you command me.
Then I command you to come back every day if you like. Make the most of me while I am here, you
will never be in my way; if I want to work, I will tell you so, I shall not stand upon ceremony. Come and
see me tomorrow.
Tomorrow is impossible, but I will come the day after, with your permission.
Come rather earlier, she called out to me, when I was already in the lobby and Babula was opening the
door on to the staircase.
I went home with a somewhat confused impression . . .
How came it that this old ill-favoured woman had such a power of attraction? . . . I felt one thing: that I
was drawn to her, that I was interested in her, and that I should look forward with impatience to the hour
when I should see her again . . . Madame Blavatsky appeared as the one fresh and living interest in this
lonely life. (P. 18 et seq. )
CHAPTER III.
(Chapter II belonging to the PervertedTale.)
In two days I did in fact go to see Helena Petrovna, and at her request, a good deal earlier, that is to say
between eleven and twelve . . .
Welcome, welcome, she rose a little to meet me and held out her hand; please take a chair and
come and sit here a little nearer. I am amusing myself with a little patience, it is my favourite
occupation.
[Note: This is the one and only instance I have found of Madame playing patience in the
morning. Actually, at this period, she was busy with the French translation of Isis
Unveiled, a colossal task, and unlikely to be playing patience. However, let the account
pass as not, at least, reflecting on her integrity. B.H.]
I felt as though from this Indian miracle-worker, in this Rue Notre Dame des Champs, there came a
fragrant atmosphere of an old-fashioned Russian country-house. This American Buddhist, who had been
away from Russia . . . among unknown people, was an incarnation of the type of the old-time Russian
country-lady of moderate means, grown stout . . . Her every movement, her every gesture and word were
full of the true Russian spirit . . . I quite expected the door to open and some such housekeeper as
Matrena Spiridonovna to come in for her mistresss orders. The door did open; but in came . . . Babula.
18
He gave Helena Petrovna a letter in silence. She asked me to excuse her, opened it and glanced through
it, and I could see by her face that she was pleased. She even forgot her patience, and carelessly mixed up
the cards. She began to talk about her universal brotherhood and captivated me by her account of the
interesting materials accessible to members of the society who wished to acquaint themselves with the
most ancient literary monuments of the East, hitherto unseen by European eyes . . . . She exclaimed, My
God, what wonderful, what amazing subjects for a novelist or a poet! It is an inexhaustible spring! If I
were to show you ever so little of this treasure, your eyes would start out of your head, you would clutch
at it.
And is it impossible thus to clutch at it? I asked.
For you, it is impossible; you are a European, and the Hindus, even the most advanced, the wisest,
cannot make up their minds to trust the Europeans.
In that case, what becomes of the universal brotherhood ?
The brotherhood is founded precisely in order to do away with this want of confidence; the members of
the Theosophical Society cannot mistrust one another; they are all brothers, to whatever religion and race
they belong. Of course, all will be opened to you, all our materials, if you become a theosophist.
[Note: Again, highly unlikely; there are many records of Madame Blavatskys method of
trying the sincerity of applicants by putting difficulties in their way, but I only know of
another instance where she is said to have fished for a member, and the member being
Madame Coulomb, the testimony is not conspicuously favourable to confirmation of
Solovyoffs assertions.]
Whether I shall ever become a theosophist I do not know; for in order to make up my mind to it, it is
essential that I should learn myself in my own person, just what it is that you mean by this wide and lofty
name; but as your society is nothing secret, and as it is neither religious in any sectarian sense, nor
political, but purely scientific and literary, I do not see why I should not become a member, when you
have explained its constitution.
. . . She took up a printed copy of the Rules of the Theosophical Society lying on the table; and I went
through it with her from the first word to the last. From these rules, I could not but assure myself that the
society actually enjoined on its members not to interfere with the consciences of others, to respect the
beliefs of their brethren, and not to touch on religion or politics. Every member was bound to strive for
his own spiritual perfection, and all had to help one another, both spiritually, and as far as possible,
materially. As for the scientific work of the society, there stood in the foreground the study of the Aryan
and Oriental literatures, and the remains of ancient knowledge and belief, and also the investigation of
the little-known laws of nature and the spiritual powers of man.
Finding that there was nothing whatever in these rules which could be considered in any way
prejudicial, I repeated that I was ready to join the society. (pp. 23-27)
CHAPTER IV.
The secretary of the Paris Theosophical Society was Madame Emilie de Morsier, a niece of the
19
well-known Swiss philosopher and theologian, Ernest Naville . . . At our first meetings we somehow felt
a mutual antipathy; but subsequently, after Madame Blavatskys departure, we drew together . . .
Madame de Morsier had received from Madame a friendly missive and some dried rose petalsthe
occult gift and, so to speak, the benediction of Mahatma Koot Hoomi . . . . . When Madame Blavatsky
came to Paris . . . Madame de Morsier . . . became the most active and eager member of the Theosophical
Society.
CHAPTER V.
When I arrived two days later at the Rue Notre Dame des Champs, Helena Petrovna came to meet me
and exclaimed: Olcott has come. You shall see him at once.
And I saw the colonel, Madame Blavatskys trusty companion and fellow-labourer, the president of the
Theosophical Society. His appearance produced on me at once a very favourable impression. He was a
man of fully fifty years of age, of medium height, robust and broad, but not fat; from his energy and
vivacity of movement, he looked anything but an old man, and showed every sign of strength and sound
health. His face was handsome and pleasant and suited his bald head, and was framed in a full and
perfectly silvered beard. He wore spectacles . . .
From the first, he showed me the greatest friendliness and attention. He spoke French very tolerably,
and when Helena Petrovna went away to write letters, he took me into his room . . . and began to talk
about phenomena and Mahatmas. (pp. 36-38)
[This may be so; but Solovyoff describes Olcott as talking without reserve to him, a
complete stranger, and we have to note that Olcott never admitted having seen his
Master, even to A. P. Sinnett, until after more than a years close friendship.
Olcotts presence supplies a possible date. Solovyoffs narrative is hopelessly confused
and almost dateless anywhere. Olcott came to Paris on May 18th for two days, then he
returned to London and came back again on J une 1st. Solovyoff represents him as being
there continuously! The following paragraph, introducing Madame Blavatskys relatives
is also misleading:]
I was sitting busy with some urgent work, when a note from Madame Blavatsky came to tell me that two
of her relatives had arrived and wished to make my acquaintance . . . . Helena Petrovna was in such a
bright happy mood that it was delightful . . to see her ... she plunged into the unforgotten and always
loved atmosphere of her family and domestic reminiscences.
While we were alone together, she talked to me only about her dear guests, one of whom I shall call Miss
X, the other Madame Y. Helena Petrovna was particularly attached to the elder of the two ladies, Miss X,
. . . who was then president of the N. N. branch (T. S. Nijni Novgorod).
Here you have the very best proof, a living proof, said Helena Petrovna, that there is nothing
whatever in the work of the Theosophical Society that can hurt the conscience of a Christian. X is a most
fiery and severe Christian, prejudices and all, and she is our honorary member and president at N.N. . . .
20
With Madame Y, a middle-aged widow, Helena Petrovna . . . was on much less friendly terms; treating
her rather patronizingly, de haut en bas . . . . Still Madame Blavatsky was greatly pleased at her arrival . . .
Her frankness of manner put us on an easy footing, and at the time I liked her . . . It is a matter of course
that it was extremely interesting to me, out of more than mere curiosity, to make out the attitude of these
two near relatives of Madame Blavatsky with respect to her work, the society, the Mahatmas and
phenomena . . . From their wonderful stories I could only conclude that the life of their whole family
simply teems with mysteries of all sorts. As for Helena Petrovna, various phenomena had occurred with
her from her youth. (pp. 39-42)
Some days after the arrival of these ladies occurred the phenomenon of the letter. Helena Petrovna had
persuaded me to submit myself to a magnetic seance by Olcott, and I was to come for the purpose every
two days at twelve oclock. I came once and found several persons in the little drawing-room.
[Account of this phenomenon. From the Private and Confidential Report of the Society
for Psychical Research, Dec. 1884, p. This account, like so much else that tells heavily
in favour of Madame Blavatsky, is omitted from the Second Report, Dec. 1885. As the
account was copied into the First Report from Light, we may conclude that the
Committee of the S. P. R. who were then investigating phenomena connected with the
Theosophical Society were sufficiently impressed both by the phenomenon and the array
of witnesses. The mystery of this First Report may never come to light, but evidently it
was composed and probably in the press before Madame Coulomb produced the bundle
of idiotic letters ascribed to Madame Blavatsky and asserted that she herself had been an
accomplice in fraud. It looks as if the First Report had been in fact already set up in type
and that no interference could be made in the arrangement of the Appendices, of which
this account is Number Thirty Five; but, above many of the appendices we find remarks,
apparently inserted late in the day, all tending to make it appear that the Committee had
been from the first highly suspicious of the Theosophists and very wide awake. Some of
these remarks pass all that Madame Coulomb herself ever said for sheer absurdity. I
quote an instance that I gave in New Universe, No. 3, p. .
Case 16. PROFESSOR SMITHS NO CHANCE LETTER. (Refer Vol. 2. Defence of
Madame Blavatsky, p. 51.) Prof. Smith: She then desired us to sit down and in so doing
took my hands in both of hers. In a few seconds, a letter fell at my feet. (Quoted in First
S. P. R. Report.)
Committees remark: There is the additional possibility in this case that Madame
Blavatsky may have thrown it.
Even if she had only thrown it with her disengaged feet without the Professor seeing
her, that would have added SOMETHING to her title to permanent remembrance.
The S.P.R. adjudged H.P.B. a title to permanent remembrance as an impostor. As I write
elsewhere the remembrance will be permanent, but not on those grounds.]
(From LIGHT of July 12th, 1884. Quoted in the First Report.)
OCCULT PHENOMENA AT PARIS
The undersigned attest the following phenomenon. On the morning of the 11th of J une, instant, we were
21
present in the reception-room of the Theosophical Society at Paris, 46, Rue Notre Dame des Champs,
when a letter was delivered by a postman. The door of the room in which we were sitting was open so
that we could see into the hall; and the servant who answered the bell was seen to take the letter from the
hands of the postman and bring it to us at once, placing it in the hands of Madame J elihovsky, who threw
it before her on the table around which we were sitting. The letter was addressed to a lady, a relative of
Madame Blavatsky, who was then visiting her, and came from another relative in Russia. There were
present in the room Madame de Morsier, Secretary-General of the Socit Thosophique dOrient et
dOccident, M. Solovyoff, son of the distinguished Russian historian, an attache of the Imperial Court,
himself well-known as a Writer; Colonel Olcott, Mr. W. Q. J udge, Mohini Babu, and several other
persons. Madame Blavatsky was also sitting at the table. Madame J elihovsky, upon her sister (Madame
Blavatsky) remarking that she would like to know what was in the letter, asked her, on the spur of the
moment, to read its contents before the seal was broken since she professed to be able to do so.
Thus challenged, Madame Blavatsky at once took up the closed letter, held it against her forehead, and
read aloud what she professed to be its contents. These alleged contents she further wrote down on a
blank page of an old letter that lay on the table. Then she said that she would give those present, since her
sister still laughed at and challenged her power, even a clearer, proof that she was able to exercize her
psychic power within the closed envelope. Remarking that her own name occurred in the course of the
letter, she said that she would underline this through the envelope in red crayon. In order to effect this
(she wrote her name on the old letter in which the alleged copy of the contents of the sealed letter had
been written), together with an interlaced double triangle or Solomons Seal, below the signature which
she had copied as well as the body of the letter. This was done in spite of her sister remarking that the
correspondent hardly ever signed her name in full when writing to relatives, and that in in [sic] this at
least Madame Blavatsky would find herself mistaken. Nevertheless, she replied, I will cause these two
red marks to appear in the corresponding places within the letter.
She next laid the closed letter beside the open one upon the table, and placed her hand upon both, so as
to make (as she said) a bridge along which a current of psychic force might pass. Then, with her features
settled into an expression of intense mental concentration, she kept her hand quietly thus for a few
moments, after which, tossing the closed letter across the table to her sister, she said, Tiens! cest fait.
The experiment is successfully finished. Here it may be well to add, to show that the letter could not
have been tampered with in transit unless by a Government official that the stamps were fixed on
the flap of the envelope where a seal is usually placed.
Upon the envelope being opened by the lady to whom it was addressed, it was found that Madame
Blavatsky had actually written out its contents; that her name was there; that she had underlined it in red,
and as she had promised; and that the double triangle was reproduced below the writers signature, which
was in full, as Madame Blavatsky had described it.
Another fact of exceptional interest we noted. A slight defect in the formation of one of the interlaced
triangles as drawn by Madame Blavatsky had been faithfully reproduced within the closed letter.
This experiment was doubly valuable, as at once an illustration of clairvoyant perception, by which
Madame Blavatsky correctly read the contents of a sealed letter, and of the phenomenon of precipitation,
or the deposit of pigmentary matter in the form of figures and lines previously drawn by the operator in
the presence of the observers.
22
Signed Vera J elihovsky.
Vsevolod Solovyoff.
Nadejda A. Fadeeff.
Emilie de Morsier.
William Q. J udge.
H. S. Olcott.
Paris, 21st J une, 1884.
The Committees remark on this is that the letter may really have been delivered to the servant by an
earlier post, thus giving time for it to be tampered with. In view of this brilliant hypothesis, Solovyoffs
own account in his book will be the more interesting. He says, p.43: I sat so that I could see Babula open
the door, take a letter, come into the room and lay it on the table . . . The letter was not only gummed in a
stout opaque envelope, but the postage stamp was affixed in the place of the seal.
[Readers who are aware that Solovyoffs book was written to prove Madame Blavatsky
an impostor, may wonder how he came to print such a complete rebuttal of the S.P.R.
hypothesis. The fact is that he had been in such a hurry to announce to the world his faith
in Madame Blavatsky that he had rushed off a letter to the Russian journal, Rebus, and his own private
account had been published over his signature on J uly 1st, 1884, eleven days before the article appeared
in Light. He could not well deny that he had seen Babula take the letter from the postman.]
CHAPTER VI.
[Solovyoff describes a meeting and conversation with Madame Y (J elihovsky) in the Parc Monceau,
Paris. This belongs to the Perverted Tale.]
CHAPTER VII.
It was at this time my lot to see more of Madame Y [J elihovsky, the widowed sister of H.P.B.] than even
of Madame Blavatsky. We used to stroll about Paris together . . . in the charming little Parc Monceau, we
sat for about an hour . . . . and Madame Y showed me so much sympathy that I was deeply touched. At
last she said: But to show you that my feeling for you is more than empty words, I will speak to you on
some matters about which I certainly would not open my mouth to any one who was indifferent to me. I
have been thinking a great deal about you lately; I fancy you are being too much carried away by the
Theosophical Society, and I am afraid that this influence may act upon you injuriously and sadly in every
way.
I heartily thank you for your sympathy, I said, but do not think I am a man who is so easily carried
away as you fancy. No doubt I am greatly interested in the Theosophical Society it cannot be
otherwise you see, I have already told you that mystical and occult matters of every sort form at
present the object of my studies. How can there be anything prejudicial, to me in them? Or are you afraid
of my turning Buddhist, under the influence of Olcott and Mohini? You may make yourself perfectly
easy on that point.
[The rest of the conversation cannot be included in this plain tale, except one sentence
where Solovyoff makes Madame J . say that she and her sister had little in common.
Madame J . was then, and remained, orthodox. She performed the somersault frequently
exhibited by the orthodox, even today: she could believe and disbelieve in occult
23
phenomena, arranging with herself to say that if the phenomena were real, which she
could not doubt, they must be of the Evil One. In later years, she apologized handsomely
enough for ever doubting her sister, but while at Paris, she seems constantly to have
challenged, and almost sneered at, the marvels the which attitude accounts partly for
Madame Blavatskys de haut en bas treatment of her; a second factor was a certain
curious jealousy on the part of Madame Vera J elihovsky of H.P.B.s beloved aunt, the
Miss X of Solovyoffs yarn. H.P.B. and this aunt were about the same age and had
been reared together and, despite profound differences of religious opinion, they
remained devoted. The sister, Vera, was from infancy only a third party and a much
younger party, and she resented this inferiority and, when grown up, tried to patronize
H.P.B. A hopeless effort at self-assertion! The elder sister could scarcely be patronized
and so Vera fell woefully into moralizing confidences with the fascinated Solovyoff. She
paid heavily for this. Solovyoff resisted all admonition until it suited his purpose to USE
VERA HERSELF as a weapon against H.P.B. Madame J elihovsky repudiated most of
the words that Solovyoff put in her mouth in the Parc Monceau and finally, in a reply she
made to his book, drove Solovyoff into such a corner that he himself was forced to
produce a letter she had written to him which is so near the wording of the alleged
conversation that it looks as if Solovyoff simply took this conversation from the letter.
Nevertheless, it is clear that Madame J . said to Solovyoff a good deal that she would not
have said except on the double supposition that she was really concerned lest he should
forsake his religion and that she was speaking to a gentleman. Solovyoff states that Vera
expressed severe disapproval of the indulgence of their aunt towards Helena Petrovna
and this is more than likely. In the end, the two sisters compared notes and become better
friends than ever was previously possible.]
So far as concerned this new theosophy and its literature, I had as yet learned nothing [he could neither
speak nor read English and the French translation of Isis Unveiled was not yet available]; in other words,
I was bound to acquaint myself with this literature and doctrine, and to make out clearly what there was
in it that was new, and what was drawn from sources already known to me.
For instance, I, like the rest of the Paris Theosophists, was much occupied with the question of Karma
and Nirvana, as set out by Olcott, Mohini and Madame Blavatsky. And this was not the only thing. There
was a great deal that was interesting. (p. 62.)
Helena Petrovna declared that there would be no more phenomena, and that she felt too weak to afford
the considerable expenditure of vital force required for these manifestations. From time to time she
treated us, though even this very rarely, to the sounds of her silver bell. Sometimes these sounds reached
us as though from a distance; they issued from the end of the passage where her room was . . . When the
sound of the bell was heard at the end of the passage, Madame Blavatsky jumped up, saying, The master
is calling, and went off to her room.
She showed us also, more than once, another small [sic] phenomenon. At some quite considerable
distance from a table or mirror she would shake her hand, as though she were sprinkling some liquid off
it; and thereupon would be heard from the surface of the table or mirror sharp and perfectly distinct raps.
In reply to my question what this was, she could give me no sort of explanation, except that she wished
the raps to come and they came. Try to exert your will, she said, and perhaps you will get them too.
24
I exerted my will with all my force, but nothing happened with me. And yet, when she laid her hands on
my shoulder, and I shook my hand, precisely the same raps came on the table and the mirror as with her.
Twice in my presence there occurred another similar manifestation; more or less loud raps began to be
heard all around her, such as are familiar to anyone who has been at a spiritual sance. Listen. The
shells are amusing themselves she said. The raps increased and began to spread. Hush, you rascals,
she cried, and all was instantly still. (pp. 65-7)
Notwithstanding that he is thus constrained to testify even eight years later to exhibitions
of a power he could not understandnor, to this day has all the multitude of
researchers discovered the secret of these raps that are heard in many a seance
Solovyoff states that he was already suspicious. Maybe he was; most people do suspect
what they cannot explain by the school curriculum. But maybe he was not, and merely
found, as so many did, that Madame Blavatsky could be teased by a pretence of
incredulity into performing some phenomenon. Also, she could be thus teased into
playing what she called psychological tricks on impertinent people. But these tricks
were really feats, mesmeric operations that had demanded a long training. Olcott gives
many instances of these feats, and calls them by the Indian word mayas, illusions of the
senses. It is more than likely that she tried her hand on the conceit and assurance of
Solovyoff. However that may be, after the conversations with Madame J elihovsky, he
seems to have pestered H.P.B. for phenomena and at the same time affected now and
again, slightly to doubt her powers; it must have been very slightly or she would have
rent him and sent him packing. The whole of this plain tale proves that he believed
profoundly in her powers and expected great things for himself. That she was irritated
with his importunity is clear, and Madame J . states (p. 292) that her diary shows that he
besieged Madame Blavatsky for private seances and with requests to be admitted to her
knowledge of phenomena. He may even have written such requests for he quotes from a
note from her (p. 72):
I can do nothing in the way of phenomena, and I am so sick of them. Do not talk about
them.
On the same page he quotes her as writing to him about his suspicion of Edouard the
clairvoyant subject of the famous paris magnetizer, Robert:
Dear Mr. Vsevolod Sergyeitch, You are the most incorrigible, not skeptic, but suspecter. Why, what
has this Edouard done to you that you should imagine he simulates? But after all, what does it matter to
me? Suspect all if you think good. It is the worse for you . . . . It is horrible to pass ones life suspecting
all and everyone. I am perfectly certain that you do not intend to express your suspicions of me before
people. I at all events have never been a suspecter; and those whom I love, I love in earnest; but of them
there are very few.
[Whether the above is a correct translation may never be known. But, as I call Solovyoff
Public Falsificator No. 1, I naturally attach no importance to any unsupported word he
says or offers. The latter part of the above may have been written long after. Certainly at
this period, Madame Blavatsky would not have tolerated any but the most ordinarily
teasing expressions of suspicion, let alone any faintest hint of denouncing her to other
people. She herself could never understand the mentality of the approver; the wretch who
25
suspects everyone and is ready to denounce for the love of it; she could only conclude
that the approver had some personal spite against his victim, had done something to
prompt a revenge. It took her a long time even to comprehend the general mentality of
that period when it was considered esprit fort to doubt every psychical experience.
Solovyoff had little indeed of this mentality, quite the contrary, but he soon learned the
tone of the day in Paris and no doubt occasionally posed as a suspecter. Madame
Blavatskys haughty treatment of even her own doubting sister indicates what luck
Solovyoff would have had with any but the most innocuous suspicions. As a matter of
fact, the plain tale proves that he had none at all, but was quite humbly sitting at the
feet of the master.]
IX.
Madame Blavatsky left for London, swearing me eternal friendship and giving me in charge to Madame
de Morsier . . . I patiently read through the two bulky volumes of Madame Blavatskys Isis Unveiled, and
this in a manuscript French translation, which Helena Petrovna had left with me, that I might consider if
it would be possible to publish it with considerable abbreviations.
On reading the first part of this work, while Madame Blavatsky was still in Paris, I happened to say to
Madame Y: It seems to me that Isis Unveiled is the most interesting of Helena Petrovnas phenomena,
and, perhaps, the most inexplicable. (pp. 69-70).
[Solovyoff was also having the first of a series of psychic experiences the which he is
careful not to mention in his book, and that indicate him as a powerful subject. The
letter below, unfortunately in extract only, was produced by Madame J .]
Paris, 48 Rue Pergolese.
J uly 19, 1884.
Dear Vera Petrovna, Your letter has given me the very greatest pleasure; and besides, I thought that you
would not forget your promises . . . . As my pressing work is now done, and we have time to breathe,
there is now plenty of room for gloomy thoughts. I must think of some fresh work . . . Raps and voices
and all sorts of uncanny things are getting the upper hand. For instance, an invisible voice says to A :
See, there will be raps on the windowpane directly, and in a moment the raps begin . . . I almost
constantly perceive breathings around me, and the presence of someone, to such a degree that it is
growing loathsome . . I have read the letters of Koot Hoomi, the Mahatma, and their contents please me
much. I am reading the second part of Isis, and I am quite convinced that it is a phenomenon. (Appendix.
p. 293.)
Letter to H. P. Blavatsky. (App. p. 287.)
Paris, Rue Pergolese,
August 18, 1884.
. . . Alea jacta est my letter in the Rebus has already raised a considerable storm, and I am beginning
to be over-whelmed with questions: What? How? Can it be? . . . Ma ligne de conduite est tracee and
you must know it. I am not afraid of ridicule, I am indifferent to the titles of fool, madman, etc. But why
do you renounce me? . . . I cannot think that any master (Mahatma) has told you that you have made a
mistake, and that I am not necessary to you.
26
Letter to H. P. Blavatsky. (App. p. 309) (Apparently first part of above letter).
Dear Helena Petrovna, I have not written to you because there has been trouble in the little house with
the little garden. Now things are somewhat easier. Cruel Karma! . . . At a certain sorrowful moment,
there was a clear and loud sound of a non-existent bell on the table, and a sudden thought of you came
into my head and heart.
[Solovyoff nowhere mentions his companion in his book. The truth seems to be that he
was then living with the sister of his wife and later married this sister-in-law. He
introduced her to H.P.B. and all company, including the Sinnetts, the next year, as his
wife; by that time, there was a child of the union. It may be imagined how singularly this
omission of all reference to the lady affects his narrative. He thus leaves himself
perfectly free in his alleged movements!]
From London Madame Blavatsky went at the end of the summer to Elberfeld in Germany and wrote me
thence: Here I am, dead beat, but in the company of Olcott, Mohini, and some German theosophists.
This is a charming little town and a charming family of theosophists; Mr. and Mrs. Gebhard, his three
sons and a daughter-in-law, and nephews and nieces, nine in all. It is a huge splendid house. She is a
disciple of Eliphas Levi and is mad about occultism. Come here for a few days. (p.73).
On a hot August day, the 24th, I left Paris. As I felt very unwell, I decided to rest half-way at Brussels.
Besides I had at that time never been in Belgium, and had not seen Brussels. I stopped at the Grand
Hotel, slept very badly, went out in the morning to see the town, and on the staircase fell in with Miss A.
To my surprise she met me most affably, We were both bored, and simply delighted to see one another. I
found that she was in Brussels on some business of her own, and that she was going to Cologne, and then
somewhere else.
And why are you here?
I am going to Elberfeld to see Madame Blavatsky; she is ill and has sent for me.
Very well, then I will go with you.
Excellent. When shall we start?
At nine oclock tomorrow morning, that is the most convenient train, or else we shall have to arrive at
Elberfeld late in the evening, not before ten.
This point settled, we passed the rest of the day together, and in the evening, Miss A. told me so much
that was startling, marvellous and mysterious that I went to my room with my head positively in a whirl,
and though it was very late, I could not get to sleep. I knew very well that in spite of all the efforts of the
orthodox science of yesterday to deny the supersensual, it still exists, and from time to time manifests
itself in human life; but I equally knew that these manifestations are rare, and cannot be otherwise. Yet
here was the supersensual in the most varied, and sometimes in the most grotesque forms, literally
inundating the life of a healthy vigorous person, one who was moreover absorbed in material affairs and
business! The whole night through I hardly slept; at seven oclock I dressed and ordered tea. At about
27
eight I received a note from Miss A. saying that she had not slept either; a sort of invisible struggle had
been going on around her, her head was aching, and she could not possibly start as all her keys were lost.
I went to her, and found her standing in the midst of her portmanteuax and travelling bags. She assured
me that all the keys were lost, every one; yet last night they were all there, under her eyes.
Send for a locksmith.
I have sent.
The locksmith appeared and opened a portmanteau: in the portmanteau was a bunch of keys, and on the
bunch the key of the portmanteau itself!
There you see the sort of thing that happens to me, exclaimed Miss A. triumphantly.
I do indeed, I replied.
As we had by this time missed the nine oclock train, we agreed to take a walk in the city, and to start at
one oclock. But I suddenly began to feel an unusual weakness, and a desire to sleep came over me. I
begged Miss A. to excuse me, went to my own room and threw myself on the bed. However I did not fall
asleep, but lay with my eyes closed and there before me, one after the other passed, quite clear and
distinct, various landscapes which I did not know. This was so new to me, and so beautiful, that I lay
without stirring, for fear of interrupting and spoiling the vision. At last, all became misty, little by little,
then grew confused, and I saw no more.
I opened my eyes. Drowsiness and weakness had passed away. I went back to Miss A., and could not
refrain from telling her what had happened to me. I described in detail, with all the circumstances, the
landscapes which I had seen.
We took our seats in a coup of the train, which carried us off, and we were talking together, when
suddenly Miss A. looked out of the window, and exclaimed: See, here is one of your landscapes! The
effect was almost painful. There could be no doubt about it, just as I could not doubt that this was the
first time I had ever travelled by this line or been in this region. Until it grew dark, I continued to gaze in
reality on all I had seen in the morning, as I lay on the bed with my eyes closed.
We reached Elberfeld, and went to the Hotel Victoria; and finding that it was not very late, we set off to
see Madame Blavatsky, in the house of the merchant Gebhard, about the best house in Elberfeld.
(pp.74-6).
X.
We found our poor Madame all swollen with dropsy, and almost without movement, in an enormous
arm-chair, surrounded by Olcott, Mohini, Keightley and two Englishwomen from London. Mrs. and Miss
Arundale, by Mrs. Holloway, an American, and Gebhard with his wife and son. The rest of the Gebhards,
had left Elberfeld.
Madame was extremely delighted to see us; she brightened up and began to fidget in her arm-chair, and
to let off steam in Russian . . . .
28
We were in a large and handsome drawing-room. It was divided into two portions by an arch, over
which heavy draperies were drawn, and what there was behind them, in the other half of the room, I did
not know. When we had talked long enough, Helena Petrovna called up Rudolph Gebhard, a young man
with very good manners, and whispered something to him, on which he disappeared.
I am going to give you a surprise directly, she said.
I soon saw that the surprise had something to do with the half of the room hidden behind the draperies,
as a certain bustle was to be heard from there.
The curtains were suddenly drawn back, and two wonderful figures, illuminated with a brilliant bluish
light, concentrated and strengthened by mirrors, rose before us. At the moment, I thought I was looking
on living men, so skilfully was the whole thing conceived. But it turned out that they were two great
draped portraits of Mahatmas Morya and Koot Hoomi, painted in oils by Schmiechen, an artist related to
the Gebhards.
Subsequently, when I had thoroughly examined these portraits, I found in them much that was
unsatisfactory from an artistic point of view; but their life-likeness was remarkable, and the eyes of the
two mysterious strangers gazed straight at the spectator, their lips could almost have been said to move.
The artist, of course, had never seen the originals of these two portraits. Madame Blavatsky and Olcott
assured us all that he had painted by inspiration, that they themselves had guided his pencil and that
the likeness was extraordinary. However that might be, Schmiechen had painted two beautiful young
men. Mahatma Koot Hoomi, clad in a graceful sort of robe, trimmed with fur, had a tender, almost
feminine face and gazed sweetly with a pair of charming light eyes.
But as soon as one looked at the master, Koot Hoomi, for all his tender beauty, was at once forgotten.
The fiery black eyes of the tall Morya fixed themselves sternly and piercingly upon one, and it was
impossible to tear oneself away from them. The master was represented as in the miniature in Madame
Blavatskys locket, crowned with a white turban and in a white garment. All the power of the reflectors
was turned upon this sombrely beautiful face, and the whiteness of the turban and dress completed the
brilliance and life-likeness of the effect.
Madame Blavatsky asked for still more light upon her master, so Rudolph Gebhard and Keightley
altered the mirrors, arranged the drapery around the portrait, and placed Koot Hoomi aside. The effect
was astonishing. One had to force oneself to remember that it was not a living man. I could not turn my
eyes away.
. . . On the way to the hotel, we could talk of nothing but the wonderful portrait of the master, and in
the darkness he seemed to stand before me. I tried to shut my eyes, but I still saw him clearly in every
detail. When I reached my room, I locked the door, undressed and went to sleep. (pp.77-9).
Account sent by Solovyoff to the S.P.R.
October 1, 1884.
(Translation from the French by B. H.)
29
Having received a letter from my countrywoman, Madame Helena Blavatsky, in which she informed me
of her bad health and begged me to go to see her at Elberfeld, I decided to take the journey. But as the
state of my own health obliged me to be careful, I preferred to stop at Brussels, which town I had never
seen, to rest, the heat being unbearable.
I left Paris on the 24th of August. Next morning, at the Grand Hotel in Brussels, where I was staying, I
met Mlle. A. (daughter of the late Russian ambassador at and maid of honour to the Empress of
Russia). Hearing that I was going to Elberfeld to see Mme. Blavatsky, whom she knew and for whom she
had much respect, she decided to come with me. We spent the day together, expecting to leave in the
morning by the nine oclock train.
At eight oclock, being quite ready to depart, I go to Miss A.s room and find her in a great state of
perplexity. All her keys, which she always kept about her person in a little bag and that she had in this
bag on going to bed, had disappeared during the night, although the door was locked. Thus, as all her
baggage was locked, she could not put away the things she had just been using and wearing. We were
obliged to postpone our departure to the one oclock train and called a locksmith to open the largest
trunk. When it was opened, all the keys were found in the bottom of the trunk, including the key of this
trunk itself, attached as usual to the rest. Having all the morning to spare, we agreed to take a walk, but
suddenly I was overcome by weakness and felt an irresistible desire to sleep. I begged Miss A. to excuse
me and went to my room, and threw myself on the bed. But I could not sleep and lay with my eyes shut,
but awake, when suddenly I saw before my closed eyes a series of views of unknown places that my
memory took in to the finest detail. When this vision ceased, I felt no more weakness and went to Miss
A., to whom I related all that had happened to me and described to her in detail the views I had seen.
We left by the one oclock train and lo! after about half an hours journey, Miss A., who was looking out
of the window, said to me, Look, here is one of your landscapes! I recognized it at once, and all that
day until evening, I saw, with open eyes, all that I had seen in the morning with closed eyes. I was
pleased that I had described to Miss A. all my vision in detail as thus say that the route between Brussels
and Elberfeld is completely unknown to me, for it was the first time in my life that I had visited Belgium
and this part of Germany.
On arriving at Elberfeld in the evening, we took rooms in a hotel and then hurried off to see Madame
Blavatsky at Mr. Gebhards house. The same evening, the members of the Theosophical Society who
were there with Mme. Blavatsky showed us two superb oil-paintings of the Mahatmas M. and Koot
Hoomi. The portrait of M. especially produced on us an extraordinary impression, and it is not surprising
that on the way back to the hotel, we talked on about him and had him before our eyes. Miss A. may be
left to relate her own experience during that night.
[Miss A. had nearly the same experience as Solovyoff now tells.]
But this is what happened to me:
Tired by the journey, I lay peacefully sleeping when suddenly I was awakened by the sensation of a warm
penetrating breath. I open my eyes and in the feeble light that entered the room through the three
windows, I see before me a tall figure of a man, dressed in a long white floating garment. At the same
time I heard or felt a voice that told me, in I know not what language, although I understood perfectly, to
light the candle. I should explain that, far from being afraid, I remained quite tranquil, only I felt my heart
30
beat rapidly. I lit the candle, and in lighting it, saw by my watch that it was two oclock. The vision did
not disappear. There was a living man in front of me. And I recognized instantly the beautiful original of
the portrait we had seen during the evening before. He sat down near me on a chair and began to speak.
He talked for a long time, about things of great interest to me, but the greater part of this interview cannot
be reported here as it dealt with matters personal to me. I can say, however, that among other things, he
told me that in order to be fit to see him in his astral body I had had to undergo much preparation, and
that the last lesson had been given me that morning when I saw, with closed eyes, the landscapes that I
was to see in reality the same day. Then he said that I possess great magnetic power, now being
developed. I asked him what I ought to do with this force. But without answering, he vanished.
I was alone, the door of my room locked. I thought I had had an hallucination and even told myself with
fright that I was beginning to lose my mind. Hardly had this idea arisen when once again I saw the superb
man in white robes. He shook his head and smiling, said to me: Be sure that I am no hallucination and
that your reason is not quitting you. Blavatsky will prove to you to-morrow before everyone that my visit
is real. Then he disappeared. I saw by my watch that it was three oclock. I put out the candle and
immediately went into a deep sleep.
Next morning, on going with Miss A. to Madame Blavatsky, the first thing she said to us with an
enigmatical smile was: Well! How have you passed the night? Very well, I replied and I added,
Havent you anything to tell me? No, she replied, I only know that the Master was with you with
one of his pupils.
That same evening, Mr. Olcott found in his pocket a little note, that all the theosophists said was in the
handwriting of M.: Certainly I was there, but who can open the eyes of him who will not see?
This was the reply to my doubts, because all the day I had been trying to persuade myself that it was only
an hallucination, and this made Madame Blavatsky angry.
I should say that on my return to Paris, where I am now, my hallucinations and the strange happenings
that surrounded me, have completely stopped.
Vsevolod Solovyoff.
1 October, 84, Paris.
[In his book, Solovyoff tells what happened to Miss A. that same night.]
I woke at ten oclock and remembered everything quite clearly. The door was locked . . . . In the coffee-
room of the hotel I found Miss A. at breakfast.
Have you had a good night? I asked her.
Not very. I have seen the Mahatma Morya.
Really? And I have seen him too.
How did you see him?
31
. . . . I described to her . . . and learned from her that while she was thinking whether she should
formally turn theosophist, or if there was not something dark in it, Mahatma Morya had appeared to her
and said: We have great need of a little beetle like you.
That is exactly what he said, a little beetle, and he said it in Russian.
We set off to the Gebhards . . . . Miss A. began to narrate our visions. Madame Blavatsky could not
conceal the delight that came over her. She forgot all her sufferings, and her eyes flashed sparks.
(pp.81-2)
XI.
[Next day, Madame Blavatsky was terribly ill, all swollen, on a great bed, and groaning
. . . . Her hand was no more a hand; it was but an inflexible thick log. Solovyoff
promised to stay and correct her manuscript, The Blue Mountains.]
. . . . The same day there arrived from Cambridge, F. Myers, one of the founders and most active
members of the London Society for Psychical Research, and his brother, Dr. Myers, who had undertaken
to express an opinion on Madame Blavatskys illnesses. The two stayed, like myself, at the Hotel
Victoria. In the evening, I had a long conversation with F. Myer . . . . He begged me in the first place to
tell him how I had seen Mahatma Morya, and when I had done so, he began to urge me to communicate
the fact to the London society in writing. (p. 91).
[Solovyoff proceeds to put words into the mouth of Myers the which the latter was
obliged to correct. Solovyoff states that Myers told him that by the rules of our society,
your communication must consist only of a simple detailed account of facts without any
commentaries or criticisms of your own. No such rule existed. Walter Leaf says in a
parenthesis: What Mr. Myers believes himself to have said is that the committee would regard as
evidence only the mere statement of facts, and could not be bound by any views or comments of Mr.
Solovyoffs own. Solovyoffs account sufficiently indicates that he needed no more urging to write this
than to write for the Rebus in J une before even the signed account could be in print elsewhere; his own
comments would be unlikely to diminish his own importance as the positive recipient of the Mahatmas
favour and as a bright particular star among the theosophists. In forthcoming letters, he will be seen
insisting on his necessity to the Theosophical Society and no doubt he believed himself to be already
possessed of powers, instead of an intermediary for the power. The note through Olcott seems to
indicate that Solovyoff would not be accepted by whoever had come to have a look at him during the
night, and the character he finally displayed makes this of no surprise.]
[Solovyoff omits to mention that he was at this period in correspondence with Madame
J elihovsky at St. Petersburg. The relations between her and Helena Petrovna were at
their worst, possibly owing a good deal to Mme. J .s efforts to detach Solovyoff from the
Theosophical Society. Madame Blavatsky seems to have passed the most indiscreet
comments on her sister to their Russian compatriot. Mme. J . says (p. 314): He took
notes of what I told him about my sister and sent it on to her, as he sent on to me what
was said about me at Elberfeld.
[While at Elberfeld however, and for long after, in fact until late in the following year,
1885, Solovyoff remained sufficiently hopeful of favours and confident of his own value
as a Theosophical witness. To Vera he shows some reserve, but there is no mistaking his
32
general tone.]
September 9, 1884.
Dear Vera Petrovna,
I have just received your letter and hasten to communicate with you . . .
I got back a few days ago from Elberfeld, where I passed a week at poor Helena Petrovnas bedside. I
must tell you that in the eyes of European doctors she is in a very, very bad way; yet she, like those about
her, believes more than ever in the power of her Mahatmas, and that her sickness is not unto death. In any
case, she will have to keep her bed at Elberfeld for a long time. The doctors have diagnosed fatty heart,
diabetes and acute rheumatism, from which her left hand is swollen, and which is not far from the heart.
She suffers terribly but is wonderfully brave-spirited. As for wonders, there is no end of them. So after
all, she may recover and with my whole heart, I hope she may, for I love her. (p. 297).
[On September 26th, he wrote to Madame Blavatsky concerning some troubles among
the Theosophists at Paris and also about some rows that had taken place at Elberfeld. He
seems to have fancied he himself could put everything right if only Madame Blavatsky
would have trusted him. The rows were, however most complicated and Solovyoff
would have been of no use whatever.]
September 26th, 1884.
Dear Helena Petrovna,
As I am not in possession of magic powers, I cannot know how you are getting on if I receive no news,
and if my letters remain unanswered. But why do you not see and know what is going on here? As you
have heard, the Duchess de Pomar has resigned the presidency. She is deeply offended with the colonel.
The defender of the American negroes has actually shown want of tact when dealing with a European
grande dame.
Of the various gossip, rumours and scandals it is unpleasant and not worth while to talk. Dramar and
Baissac might have been useful, but they have lost heart now. Madame de Morsier is fretting and fuming,
and is only held in by her love for Koot Hoomi, and partly by myself. What I can do, I am doing. I care
nothing for the Theosophical Society, the significance of which escapes me, thanks to your distrust of
me; but I care a great deal for your reputation. If I cannot do anything for it here, I can in Russia. So it is
essential that I should meet . [Sinnett.] I might, with his help clips wings; I might encourage
him, for after the Elberfeld visit everyone wants encouragement, for there were many blunders at
Elberfeld not of your making, but for some reason perhaps you do not know of them. I have nothing to
do with the rest, but I must bring you out clear. I cannot write in full detail. If you wish it will be clear
to you. Do speak out.
Yours with all my heart,
Vs. Solovyoff.
XII
[Meanwhile, the scandal that culminated in the Report of the Society for Psychical
Research and the judgment most impertinent on the part of this body which,
presumably, constituted itself for research in psychical phenomena and not for police
33
service of Madame Blavatsky as an impostor. In Defence of Madame Blavatsky,
Vol. 2, I have dealt with a large part of the evidence as produced by Madame
Coulomb, and later I shall deal with the outrageous report.
[The CHRISTIAN COLLEGE MAGAZINE of Madras had published certain letters
allegedly written to Madame Coulomb by H.P.B. On September 20th, the TIMES
published a cabled account of the affair, and all London was set talking. The news must
have reached Paris the same day, but apparently, the French papers preferred to wait for
rather more evidence against Madame Blavatsky than the allegations of a dismissed
housekeeper. I can find no data to show that any of the Paris Theosophists knew of the
TIMES sensation; it is almost certain that Solovyoff did not learn about the scandal until
some time later. The letter below seems to have taken him quite by surprise. The letter (a
translation from the Russian, of course) comes from Madame Blavatsky, still at
Elberfeld.]
Dear V. S., Tout est perdu meme lhonneur. What am I to do? If you too have confessed to me that you
suspect me to be sometimes capable of substituting fraudulent in the place of real manifestations, you,
my good and dear friend, what can I expect from my enemies? Madame Coulomb has got her way. She
has written letters which she says are from me, and publishes them (I have not even seen them yet) in a
Madras missionary paper. And these letters are said to reveal a whole organized system of fraud. But I
have never written two lines to her! It turns out that our Mahatmas are made of bladders, muslin and
masks! You saw bladders that night, so now you know. Olcott has several times seen the Master, and has
twice spoken to K.H. face to face both of them in the form of bladders, etc. Mohini will go to you in
two days, that is to Paris, on Thursday; so you will tell him and he will explain matters. But how you can
help me in spite of all your good-will, I do not know. You say that you
[This rather suggests that Solovyoff now knew of the scandal, had written to her on the
subject. If he had done so, the letter may have been burned by Madame J elihovsky after
H.P.B.s death, as alas were many others. The letters she did produce later, and that are
all given here and there in due place in the present book, are a few that were found at
Adyar and were sent to her. Happily, by that time, she had got over her incendiary folly
and realized that Madame Blavatskys defence required the production of all letters.
Solovyoff reproduces no letters from himself to H.P.B. except a few lines that do not
prejudice his own narrative.]
will have nothing more to do with the Society; but I am ready for
[This may be merely H.P.B.s exaggeration of his remark, I care nothing for the
Theosophical Society, the significance of which escapes me, thanks to your distrust of
me. It may be, also, that she thought to soothe his wounded vanity by her phrasing. It
was not the moment to be rough with her possible allies.]
the sake of the society, for an abstract idea, to give up not only my life but honour. I have sent in my
resignation, and shall retire from the scene of action. I will go to China, to Tibet, to the devil, if I must,
where nobody will see me or know where I am; I will be dead to everyone but two or three devoted
friends like you, and I wish it to be thought that I am dead; and then, in a couple of years, if death spares
me, I will reappear with strength renewed. This has been decided and signed by the general himself.
[Solovyoff called Mahatma M. thus.]
First of all, you can say to each and all in Paris that since, in spite of all my efforts, in spite of my
having sacrificed to the society life and health and my whole future, I am suspected not only by my
34
enemies, but even by my own theosophists, I shall cut off the infected limb from the sound body; that is, I
shall cut myself off from the society. They have all clutched at the idea with such delight, Olcott and
Madame Gebhard and the rest, that I have not even met with any pity. I leave the moral to you. Of course,
I shall not depart into the wilderness till Olcott, who starts for India by the first steamer, has arranged
matters at Adyar, and exposed and proved the conspiracy they gave the Coulomb woman 10,000
rupees, as is now proved, in order to destroy the society; but when all this has settled down, then I shall
go off where, I do not know yet; it is all the same, besides, so long as it is somewhere that nobody
knows. I can address my letters to Katkoff through you. Of course, Olcott will know where I am, but the
rest may think what they like. The more absurd such ideas the better. Now, here you can give me real
help. I shall trust you entirely, and I can, and will, direct the society better from a distance than on the
spot.
There, my dear friend, that is all. The rest I will tell you face to face; for I want to come and see you for a
few days without anyone knowing it if you will have me. Answer at once and dont try to dissuade me,
for this is the only hope both for me and for the society. The effect of my resignation publicly announced
by myself will be immense. You will see. And do you make haste to let it be known in Petersburg, say in
the Rebus there, that our society is not founded for the production but for the investigation of
phenomena; not for the deification of Mahatmas, but for a world-wide cause, and to show that faith in the
supernatural is superstition, folly; but that faith, i.e. science, the knowledge of the forces of nature of
which our scientific men are ignorant, is the duty of every civilized man; and that, as half the
theosophists and all the spiritists consider me, some of them a powerful medium and some a charlatan, I
am tired of it all; and since I love the society better than life, I am leaving it for a time of my own free
will in order to save the scandal. For Gods sake do this, and it will not be too late. Mohini will explain to
you all the conspiracy in Madras against Adyar and the society. Discredit these vile Calvinistic
missionaries; be a friend to me. And meanwhile answer. I want to start for London at the end of this
week. Do me a service. Ask at Rue Byron II bis, if there is a chromophotographic artist, Madame
Tchang, living there; and if she has left, where she has gone. But she must neither see you nor know
where you are. Oh, if I could only see you and talk it over, and arrange and get your advice. Now it is
war, for life or death.
We put our trust in the Mahatmas, and shall not be confounded for ever.
Yours to the grave,
H. P. Blavatsky.
P.S. Et les Mahatmas ne labandonneront pas, mais, la situation est furieusement serieuse. O. est bte,
mais it ny en a pas dautre. K.H.
[A sufficiently distraught epistle! (Be it remembered that we have only Solovyoffs
documents and Leafs versions.) Yet, in her place, many might have written worse and
have had no thought for philosophy! All through the Elberfeld visit, H.P.B. had been
tumbling from one quarrel to another. A volume would be needed to explain these rows
where conflicting ambitions of theosophical aspirants and treachery all around had exasperated H.P.B.
When the Coulomb scandal broke, Madame Blavatsky found her best friends and even Olcott, ready to
believe that there might be grounds for Madame Coulombs accusations, and they accepted the
resignation offered by Madame Blavatsky with a haste that can only be called indecent. It is not only
possible, but certain, that several of her theosophists fancied that they could run the society quite well
themselves; run it by lecturing and publishing all they had learned from or through HER! I think,
35
myself, that it was a pity that she did not abide finally by Mahatma Ms decision and disappear and leave
them to it! In a very few months, they would all have been at desperate logger-heads, have learned that
their mere half-intelligent echoings of what she had taught them could not get them very far with the
world in general, and they would have begun to plan expeditions to find her; who could answer all their
questions, and implore her to returnCoulomb or no Coulomb.
[The post-script to the above letter was written in blue pencil and in the hand-writing of
Mahatma K.H. Madame Blavatsky expressly states that she had authority to use this
script, after asking permission, of course; and we need not forcibly imagine that the
Mahatma himself took the trouble to write, even to impress a friend of the hunted and
distracted H.P.B. Perhaps he did write it. In any case, Solovyoff was so pleased at getting
a bit of this writing that he hurried off to boast of his favour to the other Theosophists.]
That very day, at Madame de Morsiers, I met the most convinced and honest of the French
theosophists; and they . . admitted the postscript to be the authentic work not of Madames hand, but of
Koot Hoomis. (p. 97)
Letter from Solovyoff in reply to above.
Monday.
Dear Helena Petrovna, I have just received your letter. Believe it or not as you like, neither it nor the
Koot Hoomi postscript caused me the least surprise. I shall produce a sensation through Madame de
Morsier. Mohinis coming, if he is well and steadily directed, is very opportune . . . What a disgrace that
I should not talk English!
It is positively essential that you and I should meet; it is impossible for me to write at length; how happy I
should be if you would come to see me . . . And not I alone, but we. And you would like it too, I hope.
Paris is not far out of the way from Elberfeld to London.
Perhaps we could come to an understanding in Russian . . . And I would escort you to London . . .
I do not know how to beg you not to be in a hurry to resign. Let us talk it over first, and if it is inevitable,
then I will leave it to you to say what must be done and where you will go.
What can one do by correspondence. I wait for further news.
Yours with all my heart.,
Vs. Solovyoff.
P.S. Do not get agitated, in the name of all the saints. (p.300)
In a couple of days Madame de Morsier informed me that she had received a letter from Madame, in
which she begged her to meet Mohini . . It is essential that he should be met, Madame de Morsier
explained to me; you see, he is coming alone, and, as his French is very bad, he will be entirely lost. Can
he not stay with you? Madame could not make up her mind to ask you straight out for this, as she did not
know if you would think it proper, so she left it in my hand.
36
I have a spare room quite by itself, I replied, and he will not be any burden to me with his
vegetarianism. To be sure, his bronze face and strange costume will make the people in our impasse talk;
but that is all the same to me.
We went together to the railway-station, and met the young Brahmin. He handed me a letter from
Madame. She wrote as follows:
Dear V. S., I tried to do as you wish, but it is impossible. To go to Paris alone when I can hardly walk
would be madness. I shall go to London on Monday. I shall remain (for I cannot help it) a couple of
weeks in London, and then I shall come to you in Paris for one week or two, as you wish. No one must
know where I am except Gebhard, who is entirely devoted to me and the cause. I have resigned, and now
there is the strangest mess. The general ordered this strategy, and he knows. I have, of course, remained a
member, but merely a member, and I am going to vanish for a year or two from the field of battle. This
letter will be handed to you by Mohini. He will stay in Paris until Tuesday. Gebhard will go with me
when I wish, and will take me where I wish. But where am I to go so that none but a few devoted friends
may know where I am, I positively cannot tell.
Understand, my dear V. S., that it is essential for my plan to vanish without trace for a time. Then there
will be a reaction and to my advantage. I should like to go to China, if the Mahatma will permit; but I
have no money. If it is known where I am, all is lost. Now help me with your advice. The master
commanded this, and that in a general way; but left the details and the carrying out to me, at my own risk
and peril, as always. If I break down, so much the worse for me. And then there is Russia; you can help
me there. Say that in consequence of the conspiracy of which Mohini will tell you, and of my health, I
have been obliged to give up active work for a year or eighteen months. And that is the truth; I have no
strength left. And now I will finish the second part of the Caves, so it will be all the better. But my
programme, if you approve, is this; let us be heard of as mysteriously as possible, and vaguely too. Let us
theosophists be surrounded now by such mystery that the devil himself wont be able to see anything,
even through a pair of spectacles. But for this, we must write, and write, and write. So, till we meet again
Mohini will tell you all.
Yours ever, H. Blavatsky.
Mohini told very little, and it was impossible to gather from his words exactly what was going on. One
thing was clear: the theosophists with Madame, had taken fright in good earnest . . Mohini stayed three
days . . . . After his departure I received the following letter from Madame Blavatsky, who was already in
England:
9 Victoria Road, Kensington.
Dear V. S., This is my new address for a fortnight, not longer. They are sending me out to Egypt and
Ceylon nearer home, but not home. It shall be done as the master has commanded not to go back to
Madras till Olcott has settled things; but to stay in Europe is equally impossible. We have thought, but
thought out nothing. We have not money enough to scatter and live each separately. Some theosophists
are going with me now to Ceylon (Mr. and Mrs. Cooper-Oakley, who are starting for Madras), but for me
to go alone without anyone is not to be thought of. My rheumatism is again about in my shoulder, and a
little all over me. If it attacks me again as it did at Elberfeld, then good-bye it will fly to the heart.
Now how are we to meet? I cannot go to Paris when I can hardly walk. Lord, how I would like to see you
37
once again! Is it really impossible for you to come here, even for a couple of days? I know that we ought
to have a meeting; but what am I to do if fate does not permit it? If I had only been a little better, I would
have come. I am dreadfully sorry now that I did not pass through Paris. But I was not alone, and it was
impossible to throw over Mrs. Holloway when she had come to Elberfeld with me and for my sake alone.
Write and advise me, my friend. It is dreadful if I am not to see you again before I start. There is a fearful
uproar going on in India. It is a war to the death with the missionaries. They or we! 220 students of the
Christian College, all Hindus, have refused to attend the courses and have left the college, after this dirty
plot of the missionaries and the letters they have printed as mine, and the notes to the Coulombs; they
have come over to us in a body.
Que cest un faux, est tout fait vident. Only a person who is entirely ignorant of India, such as this
Madame Coulomb, could have written such nonsense as they have written there. For instance, I write of
the conjuring tricks which I have arranged for the Maharajah of Lahore, when there is no such person
in India! and so on and so on. Forgery has already been proved in the case of two or three letters, but the
scandal is frightful. You can imagine how they fear and hate me, when a week before the publication of
these forged letters, on the day of the municipal elections in Calcutta, there were posted at all the corners
of the streets literally in thousands, bills announcing The Fall of Madame Blavatsky. Well, it is a
dodge, and I must be indeed a terrible person to them; it is all the Scotch Calvinistic missionaries, a most
vile mean sect, true J esuits minus the wisdom and craft of the latter. But I am not fallen yet and please
God I will let them see it. My fall shall be a triumph yet, if I do not die.
Send me an answer, dear man. Tell me if you have finished the French Isis, part II. Send it on to me if
you do not want it. Madame Novikoff would greatly like to make your acquaintance. Oh, if you could
only come here!
Yours to the Grave,
H. Blavatsky. (p.100-2)
Some time passed without a word from Madame Blavatsky. At last, I wrote to enquire after her. I
received the following reply:
Dear V. S., For Gods sake, do not accuse me of indifference. There is a most abominable conspiracy
against me; and if we do not take it in time, all my ten years work will be lost. Later on, I will explain, or
Olcott. Olcott is starting for Adyar from Marseilles on the 20th. He leaves London on Wednesday,
to-morrow evening, and will be in Paris on the morning of the 14th (Oct. 84.) He stops at a hotel, you
will learn where from Madame de Morsier. For Gods sake come if you can. I and the devoted
theosophists who are going to Adyar with me have taken a little house here together, where I shall stay
for two, or at the very most, three weeks; then I am going to Egypt where I shall stay some days. It is
impossible to say everything in a letter. Do write, if only a few words. If you only knew what a terrible
position I am in, you would not think whether I wrote or not. 0 Lord, if I could see you! Please write.
Olcott will explain all to you.
Your ever devoted, H. Blavatsky.
Olcott came, and had no fresh news to give, beyond what I already knew from Helena Petrovnas letters
. . It must be observed, however, that in spite of his disagreeable position the colonel wore a truly martial
air, and kept boldly repeating: Oh, it is all nonsense. I will go and put it right.
38
(On October 22nd, Solovyoff wrote to Madame Blavatsky a letter to which he makes no
allusion in his book. It is printed on p. 294 in the Appendix: ]
Dear Helena Petrovna, On Friday, though I could hardly stand on my legs, I passed the whole day with
Olcott. On Saturday, he and R. Gebhard who is back from the Comtesse dAdhmar, dined with me; after
dinner, I went to bed, and there I have stayed ever since. I had neglected a cold, and it got very bad . . .
The second part of Isis. I think you must send the first part too to Paris, for the book must be published
here, without fail for the benefit of the French. Madame de Morsier is very useful and she is ready for
work. It seems to me that if they keep the duchess as honorary president, then, if she is a woman of the
least sense of honour and self-respect, she must do something for the society. Let her publish your Isis.
Send Oakley to her; he will tell her that the Paris society greatly needs the publication of the book, and
trusts that the respected duchess will do her plain duty . . .
Perhaps it would be as well for Madame de Morsier to write to her in the name of the society about the
need for the publication of Isis . . . Think this over and let me know. Meanwhile au revoir.
Yours with all my heart,
Vs. Solovyoff.
[Solovyoff was clearly beginning to assume some authority in and responsibility for the
Paris branch of which be was a member. He wrote again to H.P.B., a letter.]
In a few days I wrote again to Madame Blavatsky, once more begging her to come to Paris. She replied:
Too late, dear V. S.; telegram after telegram is calling me home. There is such a hubbub there that the
world is upside down. Hartmann, one of our theosophists at Adyar, has thrashed a missionary half-dead
for a lampoon on the society and me.
[I can find no account of this fight, and half-dead is certainly more than a mild
exaggeration; but the hubbub in India was scarcely to be exaggerated.]
Now the battle is beginning, and it is for life and death. I shall lay down my old bones for the true cause:
do not bear me ill-will, my dear friend. Do not be afraid, the master will support me.
[It looks as if she had persuaded the Master, rather, to let her go and fight out the
scandal, and that he had consented with his usual warning that the consequences would
be hers to take. Far better had she carried out her first Instructions, stayed away and
allowed Olcott to act.]
I am going with Mr. and Mrs. Cooper-Oakley, friends of Madame de Morsier. They have even sold their
house, and are going with me either to conquer the foe together or to die. In the aid of Parabrahm we put
our trust and we shall not be ashamed for ever.
(This phrase indicates her state of excitement, for none knew better than she that
Parabrahm would scarcely take any interest in the Coulomb scandal! One laughs; but
poor Helena Petrovna found it all no laughing matter.)
Think what devotion! You see they have broken up their whole career. I shall not stay more than a
39
fortnight at most in Egypt, and then home. We start from Liverpool on Nov. 1 in the steamer Clan
MacCarthy, and we shall stop in Alexandria. I will write you from there and tell you everything.
Goodbye for a long time.
Your ever devoted, H. Blavatsky.
[In the meanwhile, Madame Vera J elihovsky was pursuing her extraordinary campaign
against her famous sister, still disguising resentment and, no doubt, that feeling of
defeated moral superiority which so often characterizes the families of the Ugly
Duckling, under a more or less affectedor more or less sincere?concern for
Solovyoffs welfare. During the war that arose between Vera and Solovyoff after
H.P.B.s death, Solovyoff quoted from a letter to him from Madame J elihovsky. The date
was Oct. 27th, 1884.]
You remember our conversation in the Parc Monceau? I could not then put the dots on many of the Is,
but I think I explained enough to show you that Helena and I had little in common. I love her and I pity
her profoundly. I hope that she loves me too, butit is in her own way. Apart from this feeling, which
has often inclined me to be indulgent, and even to shut my eyes to much that inwardly troubled me, there
is nothing but difference between us.
I went to see her, at her expense, on the distinct understanding that not a word should be said about her
cause and the society; subsequently this turned out to be impossible; I was drawn into the common
whirlpool, and, to my great regret, I agreed to become a member of the society, so far as my conscience
and religious convictions allowed it, and I even wrote accounts of what I heard and saw . . . If my
accounts contain inaccuracies, they are unintentional, and no fault of mine. But that is not the question.
Helena got angry with me, and ceased to write to me, and as I see, accuses me of cruelty and ingratitude.
I am very sorry. I say honestly, I am heartily sorry that our relations should have been broken, perhaps for
ever; but I cannot sacrifice my conscience even for them. I do not accuse her; what she asks me to do
seems to her a trifle; to me it seems a crime. Perhaps we look differently at things because I am a
Christian, and she is I know not what. She has been pressing me about this for a long time. I cannot
fulfil her wish, and I will not; because I consider it not only dishonourable for myself, but fatal for her.
The same view of this question was taken by the late (an uncle, a rigidly Christian uncle, who had
played a heavy part in forcing the youthful Helena into her hated marriage) the wisest man and the most
thorough Christian I have ever known. He begged me on his death-bed not to yield to her demands, and
to show her that above all she was harming herself. And so I have done many a time; but without success.
Xs [the aunt, H. P. B.s playmate and life-long friend] great mistake is that she knows no bounds to her
pity for Helena. That is why she says that she is the only one who is kind to her and loves her. God grant
that this love may not lead to the ruin of both!
V. J elihovsky.
[What can this crime have been? Solovyoff must have known, but is careful not to say!
Even he, however, does not imply that Madame Blavatsky ventured to request her
Christian sister to help her in common fraud. Then, what can have been this CRIME?
We are never informed; but I think there is small doubt that it had to do with Madame
Blavatskys aversion from being considered a MEDIUM. I believe that she must have
tried, in vain, to convince Vera that her early phenomena were never due to the action of
spirits, but to the help of her Master, even at a time when she did not know this Master
at all. As it happened, the whole family, including even Madame Fadeev, the devoted
40
aunt, would sooner have believed Helena affected by spirits than by masters. In a
Letter from H.P.B. to A. P. Sinnett (p. 154), we read:
. . . . I told my aunt that the letter received from K.H. by her was no letter from a Spirit as she thought.
When she got the proofs that they were living men, she regarded them as devils or sold to Satan. Now
you have seen her. She is the shyest, the kindest, the meekest individual. All her life her money all is for
others. Touch her religion and she becomes like a fury. I never speak with her about Masters.
Like a fury is a bit of verbal exaggeration, but Madame Fadeev decidedly did not like
the idea of these uncanny Masters, unprovided for in the Christian programme except as
priests and confessors, and probably the whole family regarded them as sorcerers of
some kind. This idea would sufficiently account for the death-bed adjurations of the
Uncle (Madame Fadeevs brother) and for Veras remorse at having joined the society.
In later years, Madame J elihovsky changed her mind about these Masters and wrote a
great deal in defence of her sister; but to the end, she persisted in seeing in Madame
Blavatsky only a specially powerful medium. With nothing definite to go on, I come
away from all this with the impression that Madame Blavatsky must have tried to
convince Vera of her own early acquaintance with the Master that had always been with
her and protecting her, but that Vera replied that she had never said any such thing and
that she herself would consider it a crime to bolster up a delusion which would be only
the worse if it were NOT a delusion. Madame Blavatskys dislike of being thought ever
to have been a medium led her near fanaticism; on the subject of spiritualistic guides,
she was plus roi que le roi! We see from the Mahatma Letters that the adepts worked
with these guides more than once. Perhaps nothing could better indicate that Madame
Blavatsky was not disguised as the Masters! The Eglinton case proves in fact that she
was left considerably in the dark about the whole affair. The only guide she could ever
tolerate was one, Ski, whom she knew to have been used by her Master, and a certain
J ohn King who apparently was used to watch her during a psychological crisis but
whom she soon threw overboard with small ceremony. The story of the Theosophical
Society shows that many a needless difficulty arose through Madame Blavatskys rather
unjust, and certainly undiplomatic, lack of consideration for the Spiritualist movement
that has proved of the greatest human value as a check to the ruthless effort of J esuitical
domination.
[In reply to Veras letter, Solovyoff wrote one that proves how far he was at this time
from accepting her views of the Masters and her famous sister. Clearly, he had passed on
some of H.P.B.s uncomplimentary remarks, but such was his nature, delighting in
mischief. The date is October 30.]
I send you with this a copy of my account of my experiences at Elberfeld, which I have sent to the
London Society for Psychical Research. From this you will learn all that interests you, and you will be
convinced of my courage in the face of public opinion. However, this courage has its limits, and I
decidedly do not wish my adventures to get into the Russian papers. I have written to Pribytkoff about
this. A time comes for everything, and in one way or another all will be explained; for there is nothing
hidden that shall not be revealed . . . Helena Petrovna leaves Liverpool tomorrow for Egypt first and then
on to India. How she is still alive, how she can travel, travel such a distance and at this time of year, all
this is a marvel to me. Or, rather, it is one of the proofs of the existence of the Mahatmas. (pp. 295, 298,
41
App.)
[Three extracts from a letter of Nov. 21 are given by Madame J . (pp. 298, 301, 302,
App.]
Dear Vera Petrovna, I cannot fear for our friendship, however calumnies may threaten it; but what
sadness all this causes! . . . It is all clear to me, and indeed one may say that Helena Petrovna has devoted
her whole soul to the society. To the society and the cause. She is afraid of your influence on me to the
prejudice of the society, and the society has great need of me now . . . I never play a double game with
anyone, and in proof of it I may quote some phrases from her letters You write that you do not care
about the society, but I have devoted to it life, health, honour, career. If you, my friend, actually
suspect me of making a fraudulent phenomenon when a real one does not succeed, what will my enemies
say? But she knows that I really love her, and that I am her friend . . . Now here is a fact. It was also at
Elberfeld that I received, to the great envy of the theosophists, an autograph letter of Koot Hoomi, and in
Russian into the bargain. That it appeared in a manuscript which I was holding in my hand did not
surprise me in the least; I had a presentiment of it beforehand, almost a knowledge. But what did surprise
me was that the note spoke clearly and in detail about what we had been discussing a minute before. It
contained an answer to my words; and during this minute I had been standing alone, no-one had come
near me; and if it is to be supposed that some one had previously put the note in the book, then this
someone must have had command of my thoughts, and forced me to say the words, the direct answer to
which was contained in the letter . . . This amazing phenomenon I have distinctly observed myself several
times, both in my own case and in that of others. What power! And beside this power, at times, what
powerlessness . . . And when she comes to the end of her life, which I cannot but think is now only
artificially prolonged by some magic power, I shall always grieve for this most unhappy and remarkable
woman.
[At this moment, Solovyoffs beliefs and hopes were evidently high; he believed himself
needed by the society; he had had the courage to send his account of the visit from the
Master to the S.P.R., and only preferred the affair not to get into the Russian papers yet
a time comes for everything . . . there is nothing hidden that shall not be revealed. I
fancy that he had returned to his early project of a journey to India, now that H.P.B.
would be there, and saw himself a future particularly distinguished CHELA of the
Mahatma. On this last point, H.P.B. wrote to Sinnett: No wonder if . . . . after having
had a good look at him Master would have nothing more to do with him all my prayers
notwithstanding. Solovyoff mentions no letters from Madame Blavatsky, but it is
unlikely that he left her alone.]
Three months had passed when I suddenly received a huge packet from Madras . . and the following
letter:
Adyar, Madras, 3rd J anuary, 1885.
Dear kind V.S., I am worn out and harassed, but still living, like an old cat with nine lives. It is a
conspiracy, my dear man, according to all the rules of J esuitical art. Will you say now that the master
does not protect me, openly and palpably? Any other in my place could not have been saved by God
Himself and the hundred devils, had I been innocent as a babe at the font! And I have only to show
myself and I am triumphant!
42
He wrote to Vera on Dec. 22nd, 84: he makes no mention of this letter or of the
occurrence.
. . . . Three weeks ago, I dined in the green dining-room, which you know, with V. I ate with a good
appetite. I drank very little, as always in a word, I was quite myself. When dinner was over, I went up
to my room to have a cigar. I opened the door, lit a match, lighted the candle, and there was Helena
Petrovna standing before me in her black sacque. She greeted me, smiled, Here I am, and vanished!
What does this mean? Here is your question once more, hallucination or not? How am I to tell? That it is
enough to make one go out of ones mind is certain; but I shall try not to do that.]
The J anuary 3 letter continues:
Only fancy, they have printed letters with my name, some forty notes and letters, the most silly and
senseless in their contents generally, but many of them in my style, and all referring to phenomena which
actually occurred. They (the letters) are all supposed to give instructions as to the best way of taking in
some dignitary or other; all this with names and titles in full, and with the usual jeers at the supposed
fools. All this has been published by the missionaries, who, as is now proved, bought them off these
scoundrels, who had been turned out of the society for theft and slander, for 3000 rupees, with
commentaries and explanations. Even before they appeared in print there were distributed throughout
India as many as 50,000 printed announcements of The Fall of Madame Blavatsky. Fall of Mahatma
Koot Hoomi. The Great Adept a Doll of Bladders and Muslin all in big letters, and posted up on all
the street corners of Calcutta, Madras, Bombay, etc. For the space of four months the newspapers, which
even do not wait and give me time to reply from Paris whether I wrote such letters and when, have been
openly declaring that I am guilty, arguing en consequence and abusing me in Billingsgate language. Then
the American and London papers take up the part of a Greek chorus; and so the game goes on. Hundreds
of theosophists are compromised, and made into laughing-stocks. Not one has wavered, they all stand by
me in mass.
[It should be noted that Madame Blavatsky scarcely exaggerates at all throughout this
letter as to the facts, incredible as such a campaign may seem to-day. Certain of the
Indian J ournals protested at the time against such a display of indecency as had never
before been seen in India. The narrative she gives of her reception on arrival is perfectly
correct.]
They have proved that the letters are forged, that the Coulombs are scoundrels and thieves, and therefore
may have imitated my writings with the missionaries (as is now proved).
[Perhaps not proved then so clearly as to-day, but something may be allowed to a victim
conscious of innocence.]
They are told that they are fools, that the phenomena do not exist, and never can exist in the world; ergo,
the explanation by trickery is most natural, especially as Blavatsky is a criminal, a well-known Russian
spy (well-known, indeed! Rubbish!) The papers are burying me a little too soon; they thought it was not
possible for me to return to India at any time. At last when they found that I was coming back in spite of
all this, they begin to cry that cest le courage du desespoir. So much for that. Meanwhile I went to
Cairo. There I learned through the consuls (Hitrovo gave me great assistance, and a letter to Nubar
Pasha) that the Coulombs are fraudulent bankrupts who had decamped on the sly by night, and had
several times been in prison for slander. She is a well-known charlatan and sorceress, who revealed
43
buried treasure for money, and was caught red-handed i.e., with the ancient coins which she used to
bury beforehand, and so on. The French consul gave me official authority to hang them (!) and entrusted
me with a power of attorney to get 22,000 francs from them. Countess della Sala, veuve Beketoff, nee
princess Hussein is ours, so is the wife of the Khedives brother. Maspro, le directuer du Muse de
Boulak, le grand Egyptologists, idem. I left Suez for home after a fortnights stay in Cairo. Fin de lacte
premiere. The curtain falls. Act II. I sail in company with Mr. and Mrs. Cooper-Oakley and the Reverend
Leadbeater (a week before our departure from London he was a parson, un cure, and now he is a
Buddhist), and we sail with a party of eight disgusting missionaries, with whom we all but quarrelled
every day about myself.
[In the Memorial book, Mrs. Cooper-Oakley wrote: Every insulting remark that could
be made about H.P.B. was heard.]
These four males and four females of American Methodists had already read the lampoons of their
devilish brethren the Scotch Calvinists, and they cackled. I looked at them as an elephant looks at a
pug-dog, and got my own restlessness calmed down. They go for my Protestant parson, and he goes for
them in my defence. In Ceylon I took public vengeance on them. I sent for the high priest of the
Buddhists, and introduced the English parson theosophist to him; I proclaimed in the hearing of everyone
that he wished to enter into Buddhism. He blushed, but was not greatly disturbed, for he had seriously
made up his mind to do it, and in the evening a solemn ceremony was performed on shore in the Buddhist
temple. The parson theosophist uttered the pansil (les cinq prceptes); a lock of hair was cut from his
head; he became a Buddhist and a novice, and I was revenged. In Ceylon we were met by Olcott,
Hartmann, and many theosophists; a whole company of us set off for Madras. The day before our arrival
(Gebhard le jeune, you remember, Rudolphe, was with us too) a new villainy had been done in Madras.
In the name of the Coulombs, the missionaries issued a pamphlet in which they added several new
calumnies to the old; for instance, that in the year, 1872 (when I was in Odessa), I was giving seances in
Cairo, that I produced manifestations by fraud, that I took money for it, was found out and dishonoured.
Fortunately, I had asked Hitrovo to get from the vice-consul, who knew me in Egypt in 1871, and used to
come to see me, and was considered a friend of mine, a sort of certificate of testimonial of good conduct.
Foreseeing that Madame Coulomb (whom I knew at the time in Egypt) would tell lies against me, I put to
the consul all the questions which could arise through her in such a case, and received a reply on all the
points stamped with the consular seal; to the effect that the consul knew me, that he used to see me every
day, and that he neither saw nor heard of any ill-conduct on my part.
[Madame Blavatsky would have been better advised to leave all this out of a letter since
it is a very long story. In saying she was in Odessa in 1872, we may allow something to
her exasperating notions of dates, but she did not go to Odessa until May or J une and
was in Cairo in the spring. She appears here almost to deny the sances, but as she never
denied them anywhere else, we must suppose her in a fix and reluctant to relate the
affair to one Whom, evidently, she did not entirely trust even then. She should have left
the matter alone. As everyone knows, she hired mediums for sances and these mediums
cheated and were caught on a day when, as Madame Coulomb admits, or lets slip, on p.3
of her pamphlet, Some Account of my Association with Madame Blavatsky (out of
print), Madame Blavatsky was not present. As for the Buddhist affair, it was in bad taste
and that is all that can be said unless that Madame Blavatsky, like many another
student of Gautama Buddhas philosophy, had small respect for the ceremonies and
trappings that have grown up around the original teaching.]
44
Well, we arrived; the missionaries were drawn up on the shore to enjoy my disgrace. But before the
anchor had been cast, a whole crowd of our theosophists was swarming all over the deck. They threw
themselves down and kissed my feet, and at last hurried us on shore. Here there was a dense mass of
people; some thirty vans with bands, flags, gilded cars and garlands of flowers. I had no sooner appeared
on the wharf than they began to hurrah. I was almost deafened by the furious cries of triumph and delight.
We were drawn, not by horses, but by theosophists, in a chariot preceded by a band walking backwards.
After an hours procession during which the missionaries disappeared as if they had rushed off to hell,
we were taken to the town-hall, where we found 5000 people to complete my deafness. Lord, if you had
only been there; how proud you would have been of your countrywoman! Imagine 307 students of that
very Christian College, whose missionary professors had hatched all this plot, signing an address which
they publicly presented to me and read amid the loud applause of the public (Hindu of course). In this
address, which I send you as a memento, and beg Madame de Morsier to translate, they say what you will
see, and abuse their own principals. The chief point is that not one of them is a theosophist, they are
merely Hindus. Then I was obliged to get up and make a speech. Imagine my position! After me, Olcott
spoke, Mrs. Oakley and Leadbeater. Then they took us home, where I spent the first night in fever and
delirium.
(When she was shown the famous hole in the wall in her bedroom, made by Mr.
Coulomb, she collapsed in disgust and anger and had a fit)
But there was no time for being ill now; on the 25th (we arrived on Dec. 23rd), our anniversary began,
and some hundreds of people had collected. I demanded that they should let me go into court with a suit
against the Coulombs and the missionaries, but they would not permit it. At last, a deputation of our
delegates begged me not to take any step without the consent of the committee of the Grand Council, as
the quarrel was rather a Hindu national, than an international affair, and I, H. P. Blavatsky, was only a
transparent pretext selected in order to crush the society.
[Actually, several Indian journals took the view that the missionaries were attacking the
Hindu religion as well as the theosophy that tolerates all religions. This is the explanation of the rally of
the Hindu non-Theosophical students. No doubt, a greater blow to Christian propaganda in India was
never given than by this extraordinary alliance of a few misguided missionaries with two dismissed
servants, the Coulombs, against a woman so much beloved as H.P.B. A frank admission of the blunder
would, even now, do no harm to the relations between ourselves and the Indians. As I have shown in
Defence of Madame Blavatsky, Vol. 2, the Coulomb fraud letters cannot stand examination; bit by
bit, the whole plot falls to pieces. In a future volume on the Report of Society for Psychical Research, I
shall expose the stupidity and wilful injustice of this Report.]
They say that my enemies are only seeking and longing to lure me into court, as all three English judges
are on the side of the missionaries; that the libel is entirely founded on phenomena and Mahatmas in
whom and in whose powers neither the law nor the ordinary public believe; in a word, that they are trying
to get me into court, to catch me in my words when provoked
[and how easily! H.P.B. was always her own worst witness]
and to condemn me to imprisonment; i.e., to kill the society and morally kill me . . . So I have left myself
in the hands and at the disposition of the committee. They sat three days and nights on the letters and
documents and called more than 300 witnesses, six of them Europeans, the rest, les natifs. They brought
in a verdict entirely acquitting me, and many letters were shown to be forgeries of my handwriting.
45
[An exaggeration. The committee sat on the letters as printed in the CHRISTIAN COLLEGE
MAGAZINE, but only four of the originals were shown to the theosophists. The handwriting is of small
importance compared with the content of the fraudulent parts that I characterize as a most rubbishy
fabrication and melting away under the least real scrutiny of facts, dates and circumstances. The whole of
the fraud passages does not amount to two hundred and fifty lines scattered through some seventy
letters; many of these lines are quite startlingly tagged on at the end of innocent paragraphs and others
are contained in short notes. The performance of such a trivial forgery would certainly not have taxed
greatly the powers of Mr. Coulomb who was a skilled draughtsman!]
One theosophical rajah offers me by letter 10,000 rupees, another 30,000 rupees, another two villages
for legal expenses, if I sue them, but the committee will not permit it. You, they say, are the property
of the society. The conspiracy is not against you but against theosophy in general. Sit still, we will defend
you. Even the public understand at last that it was a trick of the missionaries. Several letters have
appeared in the papers advising me not to fall into a trap. Lord, what a position! Here is the London
Psychical Society (your friend Myers) sending out a member to make enquiry. He too, finds it is a huge
plot.
[Hodgson expenses were paid by Sidgwick. At first Hodgson affected to be great friends
with the theosophists and most indecently abused their hospitality for many weeks in a
curiously economical fashion.]
Meanwhile, I am sitting by the sea and waiting for the weather. The solemnity of the anniversary was
immense. When the pamphlets are ready I will send them all. Meanwhile I send groups of the delegates
and a group of the residents, all chelas of the Mahatmas. Once on a time, dear friend, you wrote and said
that my honour and reputation were dear to you. Do defend me in the Rebus, in the name of all that is
sacred. You see, they will believe in Russia, and this will be a disgrace. You are my one friend and
defender, for Gods sake, my angel, do intercede for me. Write the truth in the Rebus, to prevent their
believing in the tattle of the papers. And there is another thing. You worried me to send Katkoff my Blue
Mountains as soon as possible. Well, I sent it from Elberfeld in an insured parcel at the end of September
or beginning of October and to this day there is not a word from him. I do not even know if he has
received the manuscript, or has only not made up his mind to print. He is writing me to hurry up the
second part of the Caves, but not a word about Blue Mountains. Do for Gods sake write and find out at
the office whether it is to be published or if it is lost. Ill luck on every side! May you be well and happy if
possible. Answer me soon; I dont believe that you have turned my enemy too. My greetings to Madame
de Morsier and all our friends.
Yours to the end of the World, H. Blavatsky.
Oh, if I could only see you once more alive!
[Up to this point, I have reproduced all Madame Blavatskys letters at full length, or so
far as they are given; this to show what kind of tone she used towards Solovyoff. I cannot
find that it was the tone of a wheedling charlatan towards a dupe! Far from that, she
treats him sometimes with small ceremony as one of the numerous bores who crowded
around her and annoyed her both with their fits of impotent occult aspiration and of
fashionable incredulity. On the whole, however, the tie of nationality prevails over
everything else. Solovyoff was a Russian and sacred! She writes him long letters to
46
keep his friendship and in these letters there is very little to take out as exaggeration;
they are genuine letters of friendship. Considering that she was very ill most of the time
at Adyar, almost at deaths door for weeks; that she was undergoing mentally something
as near the third degree as anyone would care to experience; for even Olcott was
constantly challenging her to disprove this or that WHICH SHE HAD NO MEANS OF
DISPROVING THEN these letters show remarkable self-restraint and moderation.
Also, we have only the translations; and Madame Blavatskys pen was the pen of a born
writer, a genius, so we need not doubt that the Russian originals lose a good deal in
lightness of touch if not in sincerity of expression. For the rest of this present book I
shall not quote Madame Blavatsky in full, but shall omit all irrelevant gossip notes
regarding her health, comfort and surroundings.]
XIII.-XV.
[These chapters contain an abridgment of the Report of the Society for Psychical
Research. Why this should be placed thus, in the middle of Solovyoffs NOVEL and
quite out of the period is not much of a mystery; he felt the sthetic need of some
support of the same muddy colour as his own inventions, in his perverted tale, about a
famous countrywoman. The report does not in the least concern us here, as it was issued
long after the events of the next chapter.]
XVI.
The spring had now insensibly stolen on, and I had not heard a sound or a sign about Madame Blavatsky
. . . Olcott announced that Madame had been sick unto death, past all hope; that doctors had pronounced
her to be dead, but that Mahatma M. had unexpectedly saved her, and that she was convalescent.
[Letter produced by Madame J elihovsky, date March 7, 1885.]
Young Gebhard has been here lately, on his return from India. He says that Helena Petrovna is very ill.
We have since received Olcotts circular announcing the miracle that has been wrought on her [her
recovery]. But in any case, in my belief, her days are numbered. It is terribly soon. Her years are not
many, and the chief thing is that her mind is clear, and her literary talent in full vigour. But what of all
this now? . . . . (p. 305. App.)
Suddenly I received a letter from Italy:
Torre del Greco, Naples,
Hotel del Vesuvio, April 29th.
Dear Vesvolod Sergyeitch,
Arrived! They have brought me back half dead, and if I had stayed in India I should have been dead
altogether. In the mangle if not in the wash, you see. The intrigues of the Coulombs and the cursed
missionaries have not succeeded, not a single theosophist has deserted; they received me on my return to
Madras with all but a salvo of cannon . . . The Russians are coming to India through Afghanistan; ergo,
the Russian woman Blavatsky must be a Russian spy. No matter that there is not a particle of evidence
for it . . . I wish you would come . . . One cannot say everything in a letter, and I have a great deal to tell
you before I go off.
47
I immediately replied to this letter . . .
[Letter produced not by Solovyoff but by Mme. J .]
Sunday, May 3rd.
Dear Helena Petrovna, I do not know how to express to you my delight that you are in Europe. At all
events, it seems that you are nearer, and that a meeting is more possible. Moreover, your departure from
India did not strike me as strange; on the first news of our movements in Asia, A. began to assure me that
the English would infallibly make themselves disagreeable to you, and that you would leave.
Remember that I told you that the time is rapidly approaching when the Russians and the Hindus will
join? You thought it was not so soon. But you see! and apart from human wishes and plans, the inevitable
destinies of history do their work . . . I cannot get the Russky Vyestnik here, but I heard some time ago
from Moscow that your Blue Mountains was to begin. Probably it is already in print. Now, you see, it is
the very time to write about India. Do get well! Scribble me a line. I will write to you when I am free
from work, and that often.
Your sincerely devoted
Vs. Solovyoff. (p.306. App.)
I communicated the contents of her letter to Madame de Morsier, who was greatly delighted, and at once
sent to Torre del Greco a whole bundle of newspapers, with remarks about the Theosophical Society, etc.
In the middle of May Madame de Morsier handed me the enclosed letter which she had received.
[The letter is in French and says that Madame Blavatsky has had no reply to her letter to
Solovyoff. She wonders if Solovyoff is still a friend. She says also, that Hodgson had
pronounced all the phenomena fraudulent and everyone, H. P. B. herself, Olcott,
Damodar all charlatans.]
What do you think of this Madame de Morsier asked me.
. . . I think . . . . that it would be well for me to make by way of pendant to Hodgson, . . . a careful and
dispassionate inquiry. Unluckily, I cannot go to Naples now. [pp. 120-1]
[Letter produced by Mme. J elihovsky.]
Paris, 48 Rue Pergolese, May 18, 1885.
Dear Helena Petrovna, What does this mean? I have written to you twice, and posted the letters myself. I
have had from you one letter in which you announced your arrival at Torre del Greco. To-day, Madame
de Morsier tells me that you have not got my letters. I telegraphed to you at once, and I am sending this
letter registered. Where our letters disappear I cannot conceive . . . But in any case you have no right to
doubt my sincere feeling for you. I do not change; that is not in my character. I too, am very ill, dear H.P.,
I am suffering seriously from my liver, and no-one here has done me any good. There is no getting away
from ill-luck and annoyances . . . Believe me that I am doing everything in my power to come to see you,
if I can only get strength enough and a spare week. But in my position this is so extremely difficult, and I
am so tied in every way, that I much fear it will remain a dream . . . What am I to do? . . . I have no right
to live my own life . . . . I had an idea of passing this spring in Italy, then I would have met you
accidentally, so to speak . . .
48
[Mme. J . writes: Here follow details of how he was being deceived and swindled. He
goes on:]
Generally speaking, I have been greatly disenchanted with the people here. Relations that began by being
friendly have invariably ended in every sort of exploitation, and rude demands on my purse . . . Your
enemies trick about the investigation of the phenomena may be all nonsense too. But force must be met
with force. I must see you; but I have only one head, two hands, two feet, a very sickly body, and Karma
binds me in every direction. Do recover! This is my heart-felt wish.
Yours, Vs. Solovyoff.
[H. P. B. had come from India accompanied by Dr. Hartmann, a Theosophist, Mary
Flynn, a devoted, although rather erratic, young lady from Bombay, and Babaji
Dharbagiri Nath, a CHELA of Mahatma K.H. H. H. P. B. replied to Solovyoff,
describing these persons; says that she is going to write the Secret Doctrine and
intends going to a quiet German town to live. H. P. B. wrote again to Madame de
Morsier (where is the original letter?) thanking her for a sum of money sent by an
unknown Parisian friend, and refers to Solovyoff: I like very much my friend Solovyoff,
but he says stupid things about our Mahatmas, this poor unbelieving Thomas.
Considering the tone of Solovyoffs own letters, there is not much evidence of this
unbelief! One can only conclude that Madame Blavatsky was indulging in a little ironical
flattery of his occasional exhibition of the ESPRIT FORT A LA MODE. He next writes
concerning his efforts on her behalf. Letter produced by Mme. J .]
Paris, 4 Rue Balzac,
Friday, J une 12, 1885.
Dear Helena Petrovna, The last two weeks have not passed in vain. Crookes and Sinnett have been here. I
have made their acquaintance; but the thing is that all is arranged and prepared to overwhelm, here at
least that is in the Paris press all this rabble of Coulombs and all the asses, to what learned society
soever they may belong, who could for a moment pay attention to her abominable pamphlet. The
pamphlet has produced universal indignation here, and I have not even had to defend you to anybody
so that after this dirty intrigue, they have only increased the sympathy felt for you . . . Ah, if I could only
see you!
Your sincerely devoted and affectionate
Vs. Solovyoff. (p. 302. App.)
XVII
[Evidently, Solovyoff escaped somehow from his financial and domestic embarrassments
in Paris, for we next find him in Switzerland with Madame de Morsier.]
. . . I sent Madame Blavatsky our address. At the end of J uly, there was a letter from her:
Dear V. S., Pardon me, I could not write; my right hand is so swollen that my fingers are numb. I am in a
bad way. I start tomorrow to settle for the winter in Wurzburg, a few hours from Munich . . . I shall go
there with Babaji and Miss F., my friend, but a great fool. Lord, how sick I am of life! Now do write if
you cannot come yourself . . . Madame X [H. P. B.s aunt] promises to come. I do not know if it will be
so . . . . I shall go through Rome and Verona.
49
Five days later came a telegram from Rome . . . I telegraphed, Come here, and explained by what route
they should come . . . having agreed with Madame de Morsier that if Madame did not come we would
meet her at Geneva. But she came.
[Solovyoff describes the plight of poor Madame Blavatsky, swollen, worn out and
venting her fatigue and ill-temper on the two companions.]
Somehow or other all was finally arranged, and in an hour Helena Petrovna settled in an adjacent house,
dined with a poor appetite, and scolded on . . . .
There, my friends, now you see my position yourselves. Some days I can move neither hand nor foot
and lie like a log, and no one to help me in anything. Babaji only spins like a top and never stirs from his
place and this Mashka F. is a born fool, and I curse the day when I agreed to take her with me. You see,
the fact is that she was dreadfully bored there at home and thought that she would find some agreeable
distractions in travelling . . . .
She suddenly calmed down, changed her manner . . . and soared into the other spheres.
[Everyone notes this extraordinary sudden change of H. P. B. from a frenzied despair at
even some trifle to other spheres; her anger was always ephemeral and unmalicious.]
And from these other spheres was heard her inspired voice.
Her thoughts . . . were always expressed by Helena Petrovna with an unusual simplicity and clearness
which were an indubitable proof of true talent, and were in fact the principal magnet that drew me to her.
At times, and quite unexpectedly, she changed into a really inspired prophetess, she was entirely
transfigured . . . (pp.132-6)
[Solovyoff decided to pass the summer at Wurzburg. Both he and Madame de Morsier
appear to have become enchanted with H. P. B., despite her fits of temper that flashed up
and passed. A week on the mountains had done her a world of good.]
I wrote to Myers that not knowing Hodgson or his investigation, or how exact and dispassionate it was, I
should undertake one of my own; I should pass a longer or shorter time at Wurzburg, where Madame
Blavatsky was to settle, and should learn everything. The results of my investigation I should report in
proper time.
This letter I showed in Madame de Morsiers presence to Madame Blavatsky, and she . . was highly
delighted. (p.138)
XVIII
I found her at Wurzburg . . . There had been arranged for her [by Dr. Hartmann] very convenient and
roomy lodgings in the Ludwigstrasse, the best street of the town . . . She again fell very ill; Babaji came
running up to me, all trembling with terror . . . Madame was very bad, a doctor, a famous specialist for
internal complaints, was greatly alarmed . . .
To my inquiry about his patient, the doctor replied: I never saw anything like it in the whole course of
50
my many years of practice. She has several mortal diseases an ordinary person would have been dead
long ago from any one of them. But hers is a phenomenal nature; and if she has lived so long, she may,
for all we can tell, live on yet.
For the moment then, her life is not in danger?
Her life has been in danger for years, but you see she is alive. A wonderful, wonderful phenomenon.
I again found Helena Petrovna all swollen up and almost without movement. But a day passed, and she
managed to crawl out of her bed to her writing-table, and wrote for several hours, gnashing her teeth with
anguish . . . pages and sheets were pouring from her pen at an astonishing rate . . . . .
[There are several things of importance that Solovyoff sees fit not to mention; that for
the first day or two, Dr. Hartmann was at Wurzburg; that he himself was accompanied by
his lady companion whom he introduced to everyone as his wife, and their child; that
Mme. Fadeev, H. P. B.s aunt arrived from Russia by, at latest, the 27th of August, a day
or two after H. P. B.s illness; that Miss Arundale and Mohini came from London on
Sept. 1st. Thus, Solovyoff could scarcely have passed much time ALONE with Madame
Blavatsky. He writes (p.144): I settled myself in Rugmers Hotel .... and all the time I
did not spend in sleeping, eating and walking through the town, I passed with Madame
Blavatsky. Apart from H. P. B.s other visitors, his own companion, must have made
some demand on his time. He keeps her entirely out of the picture in his book although,
as his letters say he had considerable domestic karma, and was not at all free to do as
he pleased. H. P. B. wrote to Sinnett on August 19th: Solovyoff is so indignant that he
has sent in his resignation to the S. P. R. He wrote a long letter to Myers and now the
latter answers him, . . . . begs of him not to resign and asks him whether he still maintains
that what he saw at Elberfeld was not a hallucination or a fraud; and finally begs him to
come and meet him at Mancy where he will prove to him my GUILT! Solovyoff says
that since he is placed by their REPORT as so many others, between choosing to confess
himself either a lunatic or a confederate he considers it a SLAP ON THE FACE, a
direct insult to him and answers Myers DEMANDING that his letter should be published
and resignation made known. He intends stopping here at Wurzburg with me for a month
or so, with his wife and child. On August 28th, she writes again: I do not see why my
aunt should delay your coming . . . She sleeps during the day and talks with me all night .
. . Rugmers Hotel is close by . . . The Solovyoffs are there . . . We see each other very
little though, for we both of us have work to do. (H. P. B. to A. P. S. pp.113, 117) Miss
Arundale and Mohini stayed a week and Sinnett and his wife came immediately after
they left. Mrs. Sinnett stayed with H. P. B. and Sinnett at the hotel. Solovyoff says
(p.138) that H. P. B. had promised him lessons in occultism: I give you my word of
honour that I will reveal all to you, all that is possible. Maybe, she said it, in any case,
she would have preferred him, an own countryman, to many others. Still, after that first
visit at Elberfeld, the Mahatma M. seems to have ignored Solovyoff. Mahatma K. H.
wrote him a word or two; as in the case of Hume, Massey, Madame Coulomb and others,
K. H. may have been inclined to try patience far longer with these slippery people than
the stern Master. However much impressed H. P. B. must have been by the undoubted
psychical value of Solovyoff, a clairvoyant and clairaudient, although quite passive, she
had to reckon with the Master as to the question of revealing PROCESS, and she knew
51
this; so it is very doubtful that she said anything about revelations, but likely enough that
she said she would show him some phenomena and give him the chance of making
discoveries for himself as every novice has to do, no process ever being told to
novices. However, very soon after reaching Wurzburg, she began to discern that
Solovyoff was an incorrigible gossip and scandal-monger, and a sentence in a letter to
him indicates that Vera had told her that Solovyoff had attacked the society (p.130).
Perhaps it was only through Vera that H. P. B. learned of Solovyoffs doubting
Thomas attitude, for not one letter to H. P. B. herself shows anything of the sort.]
XIX and XX
[In these two chapters Solovyoff tells about the phenomena performed for his
enlightenment the which perverted narrative in no wise belongs to this Plain Tale and
will be dealt with in the sequel.]
XXI
Two or three days afterwards I saw Madame X [Mme. Fadeev] who had come from Russia . . After
Mme. X there came to Wurzburg Sinnett and his wife, and Mohini with Miss Arundale.
[Miss A. and Mohini and Babaji left for London BEFORE SINNETT CAME.]
I used to call at Madame Blavatskys lodgings to talk to Madame X . . . I used to go for walks with her,
leaving Miss Arundale with Mohini and Sinnett with Madame Blavatsky. The latter was now occupied
several hours a day, dictating (Incidents in the Life of Madame Blavatsky, published 1886.)
Miss Arundale soon went back to London, taking with her Babaji as well as Mohini. I also was on the
point of leaving Wurzburg . . . Before my departure I paid Madame a farewell visit.
[Madame Blavatsky had prophesied certain future events to happen to Solovyoff during
the next two months. We never learn WHAT were these prophecies, but among them
certainly was some kind of statement referring to Solovyoffs psychical development
and, possibly, that he would once again be taken in hand by the Master M. Maybe, H. P.
B. fancied that she could persuade the Master; there is plenty of evidence that she
frequently exercised her CHELA right to propose a new novice for whom she would be
responsible. However that may be, Solovyoff went away so full of faith in his
approaching glorification that he sought out Professor Richet in Paris. A letter Solovyoff
solicited from Richet after H. P. B.s death throws some light on Solovyoffs
communication to him, and can scarcely have been quite satisfactory to Solovyoff. I
translate from page 346.]
When I saw you, you said to me Reserve your judgment, she has shown me some astonishing things,
my opinion is not quite decided yet, but I thoroughly believe that she is an extraordinary woman,
endowed with exceptional faculties. Wait, and I will give you further explanations.
Letter produced by Mme. J . p.288. App.]
Paris, Oct. 8, 1885.
Dear Helena Petrovna, Which is the better, to write at random, or to hold ones tongue and work for the
52
good of ones correspondent? . . . I have made friends with Madame Adam, and talked a great deal to her
about you; I have greatly interested her, and she has told me that her Revue is open not only to theosophy
but to a defence of yourself personally if necessary. I praised up Madame de Morsier to her, and at the
same time there was another gentleman there who spoke on your behalf in the same tone, and Madame
Adam wished to make acquaintance with Madame de Morsier, who will remain in Paris as the official
means of communication between me and the Nouvelle Revue. Yesterday, the meeting of the two ladies
took place; our Emilie was quite it raptures . . . It any case, this is very good. To-day I passed the morning
with Richet, and again talked a great deal about you, in connexion with Myers and the Psychical Society.
I can say positively that I convinced Richet of the reality of your personal power and of the phenomena
which proceed from you. He put me three questions categorically. To the first two I answered
affirmatively (Presumably, that she had shown him phenomena and that she possessed extraordinary
faculties); with respect to the third I said that I should be in a position to answer affirmatively, without
any trouble, in two or three months. But I do not doubt that I shall answer affirmatively, and then you
will see! There will be such a triumph that all the psychists (S.P.R.) will be wiped out ... Yes, so it will
be; for you did not treat me as a doll? . . . I start the day after to-morrow for St Petersburg . . . What will
happen?
Yours cordially devoted
Vs. Solovyoff.
THE SEQUEL
What did happen? Apparently, nothing. Solovyoff was given neither visual, auditory nor
documentary evidence of the existence of the Masters. And then you will see! there will
be such a triumph that all the psychists will be wiped out. Solovyoff nursed the
remarkable delusion (suffered long since by A. O. Hume and others) that if only HE were
put in a position to swear to the phenomena, the world would be quite satisfied; this
same world that rejected one who could DO the phenomena! The case is exactly that, for,
if Solovyoff had not been convinced that the phenomena were genuine, he would not
have dreamed of being able to prove them to the world.
And here he was completely ignored and rejected; what a position! He had
convinced Richet and Madame Adam and who knows who else of the powers of
Madame Blavatsky; he had patronized our Emilie, Madame de Morsier, whom, later,
when she takes his side, he will call the noblest of women; had certainly shown off to all
the Paris theosophists, none of whom had been honourd by a note from the Master, even
so much as to tell them that he could not open their eyes that would not see. He had
written to the S.P.R. and Myers severe letters, had published his experiences in the
S.P.R. J ournal and in the REBUS. Above all, again Richet, he had CONVINCED
RICHET: and here he was with all this gossip about him floating around and himself
with nothing to show for all his boasting. What could he do? Only one thingdenounce
Madame Blavatsky as a charlatan and so be received back by Richet, Myers and
Company with some sort of dignity left: as a scientific enquirer, who, like the rest, had
thought it his duty to look into these strange matters, impartially; impartially, without
fear to find himself the dupe of the charlatan and then to denounce her, a painful, but
public, duty.
And this is what Solovyoff did.
53
On his return to St. Petersburg, Madame J ell hovsky received him with open arms,
sympathized with all his troubles and more than once, as she confesses
tried to prevent his losing his head; trusting to his honour (?) I even allowed myself to make statements
which, perhaps, I had no right to make. I never concealed my mistrust of the miraculous side of my
sisters work; I told her so openly, and at this time, ignorant of much that I learned afterwards, I was in
many ways unjust to her and to those about her. I should, of course, have been more reticent in my
admissions, could I have foreseen that he would make use of my friendly confidence, not for his own
profit only, but as a weapon to sow discord between us by revealing it. (app. p.290.)
Veras orthodox arguments gave him the best mantles to throw over his defeat; from this
time, Solovyoff grasped the possibility of figuring as a saviour of Christian Russia from
what he calls the miasmic exhalations of Theosophy. Christians may perhaps not be
too grateful to him. He writes on p.284:
If a new sect has any, success, it gathers adherents chiefly among the hysterical who are susceptible of
suggestion.
The feeblest Christian might object to this analysis of the beginnings of successful
religions.
Meanwhile, Theosophical history was being made in other directions, in ways that
singularly fortified Solovyoff and his schemes. A scandal concerning Mohini and some
ladies had burst in London and Paris. Madame de Morsier was seriously upset. A letter
from H.P.B., advising public discretion about the whole affair merely exalted her into the
notion of perishing POURVU QUE J E FASSE MON DEVOIR, her notion of this duty
being, apparently, to publish the scandal far and wide and thus bring suffering on the
innocent numbers of Theosophists.
At this moment, also, the news of the coming Report denouncing H.P.B. as an impostor
was sedulously being scattered by the S.P.R. Undoubtedly, Solovyoff was early informed
of it by his friend, Myers. At the end of December, he returned to Paris and immediately
clanned with Madame de Morsier and her party. He told Mme. de M. that H.P.B. had
believed in Mohinis guilt from the very first. A lie. She never believed it to the last, but
none the less, advised against an official enquiry that would have oozed through
somehow to the newspapers. In fact, there is no evidence against Mohini further than that
he had replied to love-letters from a certain lady. But Madame de Morsier had set off on
a path from which she seems to have felt small inclination to return. She showed
Solovyoff a letter in which his own precious name was mentioned. He then wrote to
Madame Blavatsky a letter that she describes to Sinnett as a thundering, sickening,
threatening letter. He threatens that if I bring his name into this dirty scandal, all my
devils (meaning Masters) will not save me from utter ruin. He speaks of Baron
Meyendorf of Blavatsky, and the reputation made for me by FRIENDS in Russia and
elsewhere.
The fact seems to be that Vera and her daughters, who declared that H.P.B.s name
stank in their nostrils as Christians, had gossipped with quite shameful family
54
disloyalty to Solovyoff, and about matters of which it is very clear they never knew the
real circumstances. What the tales were exactly we never hear. Solovyoff cannot produce
any of them. His book is quite vague on the subject. Maybe, he got nothing but vague
hints. All the rumours about H.P.B.s wild youth boil down to almost nothing!
Examination by the gynecological specialist, Oppenheim, proved that she was physically
deformed and practically an hermaphrodite and could not have indulged in any of the
pranks usually included in the expression, a wild youth. Wild she was, but her wildness
was for complete freedom to study occultism. We scarcely need her own statement to
confirm the obvious attitude of the orthodox among her family towards this study. . . She
says that she deliberately led people to accuse her of seeking love-affairs in her
wanderings, as a cover for what she was really engaged in, and for which some of the
family would have anathematized her. One of the most touching traits in H.P.B. is her
affection for this family that so long treated her as the Ugly Duckling. Her letters to Vera
contain a few small deceptions. Whose fault? The families of geniuses are mostly
unsympathetic (less so, nowadays, perhaps, when genius is recognized as a commercial
asset to possible heirs and heiresses at least, after a first bit of favourable publicity).
Madame Blavatsky knew better than to give babes strong meat, and indeed it took Vera
many years to grow up to the view of her sister as a vastly superior personage whom she
could only honour without hope of deeply understanding. H.P.B. forgave (though that is
hardly the word, but one should rather say, calmly overlooked) all the damage Vera had
done to her, took her to her bosom and died happily friends.
Solovyoffs letter drove H.P.B. into a frenzy. It was, as she says, the last straw on the
burden of slander, disloyalty and treachery she was suffering from all sides, her only
friend near at this time being the angelic Countess Wachtmeister. The S.P.R. Report was
out; every post, so the Countess tells us, brought letters from wavering Theosophists
when not stark insults from some who resigned. It is a story that would take volumes to
tell properly, so many lines cross and re-cross, so many mysteries there are to be
unwound; and some are probably beyond unwinding. She was ill as few have been ill and
lived. And she was writing the Secret Doctrine. Fallen on evil days and evil tongues,
she continued as genius does continue in spite of all.
I think it likely that Solovyoff, for once, speaks the truth when he says he had not written
to her for some time and had left a letter or two (she says that she only wrote him three
times) without reply. She must have wondered painfully why he did not reply, for that
she had taken him into her almost uniquely wide, if not very deep, perhaps, affection,
there is small doubt. She loved everyone in a way and could always overlook any
mischief they did to her and I verily believe that if even the Coulombs had turned up
again in misery and tears, she would soon have been giving them tea and chatting of old
times and saying in that quaint way of her But why did you do it, what had I done to
YOU? How damned absurd of you! What fools! Well, let it go.
It is likely, too, that she expected that her Master would again take some notice of
Solovyoff. Had he not come to see her when she was under the cloud, come even to
Wurzburg and stuck to her, sent angry letters to Myers and his resignation from the
S.P.R.? From all we can gather, this Master had made up his mind about Solovyoff
during that astral visit at Elberfeld: there would be no further relations between them.
55
The liar and bully he proved himself to be would have been written in his aura as well as
the egoistic and upstart motives of his craving for chelaship and the possession of the
powers he saw in H.P.B. She would not be told plainly that he was rejected but left to
find it out for herself if she could, for such is the rule; but the usual hint she doubtless
did get and failed to take, as she had failed more than once before in similar cases, and
precisely through that careless liking, she rarely could quite abandon anyone she had
known at all intimately. Theosophical story is full of instances of her struggles not to see
what was impossible to tolerate in anyone she liked. It is a kind of virtue none too
common, but the defect of it is fatal in a chela, whose whole business it is to develop
cool clarity of understanding, however charitably he might act. She confused frequently
this psychological process, thinking uncharitably but blinding herself and acting as
though she had seen nothing to beware of. It was only in piercing to a persons occult
capacities that she could be cool; ordinary dealings in human nature found her ready to
take everyone to her capacious bosom and many a snake she took! Her adventures in this
way would be sufficiently amusing if some had not turned out a tragedy for her. What is
certain is that no soul of her sort was ever an intriguer with the least success! She was to
the last absolutely unable to refrain from saying what she thought of anyone at the time. .
She made enemies of the stupid and pompous, but her friends adored her even although
she trod on their own toes. You know you dont mean it! could always bring her to that
state of winsomeness that both Olcott and Countess Wachtmeister noted as such a lovely
trait. Her swearing at you at times became quite unimportant once
you knew her.
And so, she liked the amusing, conversational Solovyoff, the Russian from her own
Russia, and managed to forget or overlook what she had seen well enough at times, the
bitter-minded, ambitious man, a bad gossip too. (See H.P.B. to A.P.S. P. 184.) Yet, a
clairvoyant and clairandient, he had come under notice of her Masters who are said to
examine every psychic as a possible blessing to humanity and to be protected, but also as
a possible curse and to be left to those who may be called for short, their father, the
devil. Madame Blavatsky knew much about all this that the non-psychic world laughs at,
and when Solovyoff departed for Russia, still vowing friendship, doubtless she supposed
that he had still a chance. We bade one another farewell as though we were dearest
friends, almost with tears . . . Not a word, except vows that he would stand up for me in
Russia, and help me in every way did I hear. And then he suddenly goes and holds his
tongue. Without cause or reason he is in quite a different mood in St. Petersburg. You do
not know, in the innocence of your soul, but I know; he is simply frightened of the abuse
of the Psychical Society . . . You see, they have declared of a Gentil-homme de la
chambre that he is either a liar or suffers from hallucinations . . . . Thus she writes to
Vera after receiving the thundering, sickening threatening letter, not knowing at the
time what she will soon know; and almost as soon forgive, that Vera herself was for
something in Solovyoffs change of attitude, that Vera had exercised her Christian
influence and gone the length of telling the scoundrel some early gossip about her sister.
But what could this gossip have been? Obviously Solovyoff was never given any
particulars or he would have put them in his book. The story was probably not known in
its particulars to Vera who was still a schoolgirl when H.P.B. was married. Vera could
only have heard vaguely of a romance that was surely never known in full even to the
56
elders. Madame Ermeloff gives us a clue in her Memoirs. I had vowed never to draw
attention to this romance, but someone else may do worse . . . As a very young girl,
Helena Petrovna gazed with awe and adoration on a certain prince, an occultist. She fled
to, not with, him, and he almost certainly sent her back home. Then, her father being far
away and her mother long dead, the angry grandfather and aunt married her off quickly
to Mr. Blavatsky. She speaks to Sinnett of her prayers and supplications not to be
married to old Blavatsky. There is a story that she herself induced Blavatsky to propose
because her governess declared that no-one would marry her, so ugly and ill-tempered.
Change that to so disgraced and there may be much truth in it. If she did induce the
unfortunate man to propose, she was horrified at the resolution to make her go through
with the contract. And she soon fled again, now a real married woman and, as she seems
to have understood it, free to take the road to liberty with no grandfathers and aunts to
interfere. Off she went, and maybe she met the prince again, maybe not. I should say,
yes; but I believe her own words that she loved occultism more than man and her medical
dossier proves that, for her, loves young dream can never have been anything but a
dream. Nothing is known. One day, some great novelist may make a story of it, but
nothing is known.
The whole province had gossipped, however, and the echoes of this gossip reached
Solovyoff, vague even as echoes, for his pen at its most malignant is reduced to
blustering hints. Solovyoffs sickening threatening letter has apparently not been
preserved. H.P.B. immediately sent it to her aunt, Madame Fadeev, as we learn from a
letter to Vera, quoted on p. 314:
It is my fault that they were angry with you. I have done a foolish act. In vexation and anger at you, I
sent off to them a letter of Solovyoffs to me, that begins in a most mysterious style: After what has
happened, I can have no further communication with you. And it ends with all sorts of allusions to
matters twenty and thirty years old.
To Sinnett, she wrote with more hope of sympathy: He threatens that if I bring his name
into this dirty scandal, all my devils (meaning MASTERS) will not save me from utter
ruin. He speaks of Baron Myendorf of Blavatsky, and the reputation made for me by
friends in Russia and elsewhere . . . Solovyoff threatens me moreover that Mr. Blavatsky
is not dead but is a charming centenarian who had found fit to conceal himself for years
on his brothers property.
H.P.B.s reply to Solovyoff begins with a paragraph of pure genius.
I have made up my mind. Has the following picture ever presented itself to your literary imagination?
There is living in the forest a wild boar an ugly creature, but harmless to everyone so long as they
leave him at peace in his forest, with his wild beast friends who love him. This boar never hurt anyone in
his life, but only grunted to himself as he ate the roots that were his own, in the sheltering woods. For no
reason, a pack of fierce dogs is loosed against him; men chase him from the woods, threaten to burn his
native forest and to leave him a wanderer, homeless, for anyone to kill. For a while, he flies before the
hounds, although he is no coward by nature. He tried to escape for the sake of the forest, lest they burn it
down. But lo! one after another, the wild beasts which were once his friends join the hounds; they begin
to chase him, yelping and trying to bite and catch him, to make an end of him. Worn out, the boar sees
that his forest is already set on fire and that he cannot save either it or himself. What is left? What can the
57
boar do? Why, thus: he stops, he faces the mad pack of dogs and beasts and shows his spirit, himself as
he really is. He bounds on his foes in their turn. He slays them until he has no more strength, until he falls
dead and then he is really powerless.
Imagine a woman who could write like that being pestered to death about a faux pas de
jeunesse! The world gets what it deserves, it gets lying novelettes by the Solovyoffs and
is stuck deeper in the mire it is so willing to inhabit, but alas! we others lose all those
books that an H. P. Blavatsky might have written had she found the encouragement such
an art and an artist demands.
The horrible comedy of the thing is that the faux pas was a next to nothing! A romantic
flight of a sixteen-year old at worst. And then, to be married off to an elderly general and
sent all wrong in everyones eyes through doing the only thing she could do, namely, run
away after the marriage. And how she came to exaggerate the sin and wickedness of this
youthful escapade! The chance is, though, that she was probably not in the least
repentent on the side of Society, but she was certainly terrified on the side of the
Theosophical Society, her forest, that the mad pack of dogs was trying to burn down,
using the pot of old scandal as paraffin. Already, for several months, Hodgson of the
Society for Psychical Research and Madame Coulomb had been spreading rumours and
lies about her sex past, only stopping at a bunch of three illegitimate children. All this,
however, merely annoyed and did not terrify H.P.B., for she knew there was nothing in
it; but now, this Russian affair she knew that there was some truth in that, knew also,
how the truth had been mauled and exaggerated in Russia. She knew, too, that people
there commonly believed her to be the mother of Baron Myendorfs crippled son whom
she had adopted . . .
I should judge that, in her somewhat blind anger and indignation, in the fury she felt at
being chased and bitten by so many supposed friends all around, she could believe
anything of anyone, and actually imagined that Meyendorf had, at least, not contradicted
Solovyoffs gossip about the child; actually, it is doubtful whether Solovyoff had seen
the Baron, for in a letter to Sinnett she writes: Then he mixed Baron M.s names with
his lies and the Baron swore he would cut his nose off, whenever he met him, for he
has never told S. anything about me as Solovyoff avers, and I wrote to the Baron. So do
not be anxious. The Baron seems to have been a feeble creature enough who would cut
nobodys nose off; but he knew a great deal about H.P.B. It is likely that she had some
occult experiences with him in Paris in 1858 and that he confided in the medium,
Dunglas Home, who, like many another medium, hated the occultism that left his own
psychic phenomena in the shade, as being entirely outside his own control, and who
seems to have warned the Baron that she was a dangerous person. It is possible, of
course, that the Barons child was not born until after his confidences to Home and that
at that moment, he was under no obligation to Madame Blavatsky for saving him and the
mother from a scandal that would have ruined them both. I think that it would not be
difficult to trace the mother as a member of the Blavatsky family, the which relationship
would account for General Blavatskys subsequent indulgence in 1862 towards his
runaway wife, to the length, indeed, of associating himself with the wardship of the
child; and this relationship would account for Madame Blavatskys own sacrifice in the
matter, sacrifice she pushed to the enthusiastic limit of trying to smooth the future path
58
of the infant by giving it a public appearance of legitimacy and saying that it was her
own! Women do these things.
But what the Baron also knew, probably from H.P.B. herself in a moment of
self-deprecation a confession to set the sinners more at their ease was the
provincial gossip about her own young adventure. Home is said to have hinted that he
knew a lot about Madame Blavatskys youth; and there was nothing but that to know and
the fact that she ran away from Mr. Blavatsky. The circumstance that Home heard all this
in 1858 when he and the Baron were intimate in Paris indicates Myendorf as his
confidant.
In her fit of frenzied disgust, H.P.B. theratens to settle the whole world of traitors once
and for all by telling the whole story, everyones and her own. But she never went further
than the threat. To carry out the threat she would have needed to name people, and that
she would not have done; also, she had the Secret Doctrine to write. These rumours
soon passed into the back of her mind and we hear little more concerning them.
However, her letter to Solovyoff has fortunately become public and we get a glimpse of
her in a real rage she was not often in a real rage, only in a half-comic temper with
tepid coffee and fools or with one of her phenomenally diseased organs her opinions
about which she passed on without proper explanation to the nearest handy person. I
cannot resist the impression, however, that she rather enjoyed this confession a la russe,
examples of which we lately saw in the Soviet trials, where you say everything and
something more, where the role of sinner once assigned and accepted is played to bring
the house to its feet.
Believe me I have fallen because I have made up my mind to fall, or else to bring about a reaction by
telling all Gods truth about myself, but without mercy on my enemies. On this I am firmly resolved, and
from this day I shall begin to prepare myself in order to be ready. I will fly no more. Together with this
letter or a few hours later, I shall myself be in Paris, and then on to London. A Frenchman is ready, and a
well-known journalist too, delighted to set about the work and to write at my dictation something short,
but strong, and what is most important, a true history of my life. I shall not even attempt to defend, to
justify myself. In this book I shall simply say: In 1848, I, hating my husband, N. V. Blavatsky (it may
have been wrong, but still such was the nature God gave me), left him, abandoned him a virgin ( I
shall produce documents and letters proving this, although he himself is not such a swine as to deny it). I
loved one man deeply, but still more I loved occult science, believing in magic, wizards, etc. I wandered
with him here and there, in Asia, in America, and in Europe. I met with So-and-so (You may call him a
wizard, what does it matter to him?) In 1858 I was in London; there came out some story about a child,
not mine (there will follow medical evidence, from the faculty of Paris, and it is for this that I
am going to Paris)..
She never bothered, the certificate given by the gynecological specialist, Professor
Oppenheimer of Wurzburg being archi-sufficient for the friends who knew the surgeon
and the witness, Dr. Roeder, Medical Officer of the District.
One thing and another was said of me; that I was depraved, possessed with a devil, etc. I shall tell
everything as I think fit, everything I did, for the twenty years and more that I laughed at the quen
dira-t-on and covered up all traces of what I was really occupied in, i.e., the sciences occultes, for the
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sake of my family and relations who would at that time have cursed me. I will tell how from my
eighteenth year I tried to get people to talk about me, and say about me that this man and that was my
lover, and hundreds of them. I will tell too a great deal of which no one ever dreamed, and I will prove it.
Then I will inform the world how suddenly my eyes were opened to all the horror of my moral suicide;
how I was sent to America to try my psychological capabilities.
[Footnote: Moral, nowadays, means, of course something to do with sex; but to H. P.
Blavatsky, moral suicide meant among other things, that she was not using, or was
mis-using, for salon phenomena, the knowledge she had been taught during her first sojourn in Tibet. Her letters a
psychological lapse about 1862, was extremely ill, and came under bad occult influences. She fought her
way through it, disappeared in 1864 and no doubt worked her salvation, for she went again to Tibet in
1867 or early 68 with her Master; it is significant that only then was she introduced to the Mahatma
H.H.]
How I collected a society there and began to expiate my faults, and attempted to make men better and to
sacrifice myself for their regeneration. I will name all the theosophists who were brought into the right
way, drunkards and rakes, who became almost saints, especially in India, and those who enlisted as
theosophists, and continued their former life, as though they were doing the work (and there are many of
them) and yet were the first to join the pack of hounds that were hunting me down and to bite me. I will
describe many Russians, great and small Madame S among them, her slander and how it turned out
to be a lie and a calumny. I shall not spare myself, I swear I will not spare; I myself will set fire to the
four quarters of my native wood, the society to wit, and I will perish, but I will perish with a huge
following. God grant I shall die, shall perish at once on publication; but if not, if the master would not
allow it, how should I fear anything? Am I a criminal before the law? Have I killed anyone, destroyed,
defamed? I am an American foreigner, and I must not go back to Russia. From Blavatsky, if he is alive,
what have I to fear? It is thirty-eight years since I parted from him, after that I passed three days and a
half with him in Tiflis in 1863, and then we parted again. Or M ? I do not care a straw about that
egoist and hypocrite! He betrayed me, destroyed me by telling lies to the medium Home, who has been
disgracing me for ten years already, so much the worse for him.
[She imagines so; actually, Home said nothing much, although he probably said it very
often, mainly sneers at her occultism.]
You understand, it is for the sake of the society I have valued my reputation these ten years. I trembled
lest rumours founded on my own efforts
[a splendid case for the psychologists, for Richet and Co.]
and magnified a hundred times, might throw discredit on the society while blackening me. I was ready to
go on my knees to those who might help me to cast a veil over my past; to give my life and powers to
those who helped me. But now? Will you, or Home the medium, or M , or anyone in the world,
frighten me with threats when I have myself resolved on a full confession? Absurd! I tortured and killed
myself with fear and terror that I should damage the societykill it. But now I torture myself no more. I
have thought it all out, coolly and sanely, I have risked all on a single card all! I will snatch the
weapon from my enemies hands and write a book that will make a noise all through Europe and Asia,
and bring in immense sums of money to support my orphan niece, an innocent child, my brothers
orphan. Even if all the filth and scandal and lies against me had been the holy truth, still I should have
been no worse than hundreds of princesses, countesses, court ladies and royalties, than Queen Isabella
herself, who have given themselves, even sold themselves to the entire male sex, from nobles to
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coachmen and waiters inclusive; what can they say of me worse than that? And all this I myself will say
and sign. (Sic.)
[I confess that I transcribe this tirade with some amusement! Madame Blavatskys
annoyance has entirely run away with her. But immediately she is on a level to which her
feet are accustomed, and her anger becomes real again.]
No, The devils will save me in this last great hour. You did not calculate on the cool determination of
despair, which was and has passed over. To you I have never done any harm whatever, I never dreamed
of it. If I am lost, I am lost with everyone. I will even take to lies, to the greatest of lies, which, for that
reason, is the most likely to be believed. I will say and publish it in the Times and all the papers, that the
master and Mahatma K.H. are only the product of my own imagination: that I invented them, that the
phenomena were all more or less spiritualistic apparitions, and I shall have twenty million spiritists in a
body at my back. I will say that in certain instances I fooled people; I will expose dozens of fools, des
hallucines; I will say that I was making trial for my own satisfaction, for the sake of experiment. And to
this I have been brought by you. You have been the last straw that has broken the camels back under its
intolerably heavy burden.
Now you are at liberty to conceal nothing. Repeat to all Paris what you have ever heard or know about
me. I have already written to Sinnett forbidding him to publish my memoirs at his own discretion. I
myself will publish them with all the truth. So there will be the truth about H. P. Blavatsky, in which
psychology and all her own and others immorality and Rome and politics and all her own and others
filth once more will be set out to Gods world. I shall conceal nothing. It will be a Saturnalia of the moral
depravity of mankind, this confession of mine, a worthy epilogue of my stormy life. And it will be a
treasure for science as well as for scandal: and it is all me, me; I will show myself with a reality that will
break many, and will resound through the world. Let the psychist gentlemen [S.P.R.] and whosoever will
set on foot a new enquiry. Mohini and all the rest, even India, are dead for me. I thirst for one thing only,
that the world may know the reality, all the truth, and learn the lesson. And then death, kindest of all.
H. Blavatsky.
You may print this letter if you will, even in Russia. It is all the same to me now.
Solovyoff did not print this letter, at least not until she was dead. Unfortunately, we
cannot be sure that his version of it is even correct. In an Appendix, I show that he
juggled with one portion to suit his own evil purposes and it is more than probable that
he suppressed references to himself and inserted little phrases that give a colouring to
suit himself. In fact, the whole of the passage before the last, that contains the portion
that we know he faked must be taken with many suspicions. As he changed the grammar
and sense in one absolutely important instance, so he may have changed the grammar
and sense more than once. Allowing for all possible incoherence owing to the rage of a
woman already hunted and wounded, and now faced with the thundering, sickening,
threatening attitude of one from whom she had parted as a real Russian friend one
feels that there are gaps in the letter. However, the thing being mainly a tirade and
actually saying nothing much, it sounds not very important to-day. If she had had
anything to confess, she would have let slip some news of it in that state of fury and not
have burbled Solovyoff with those Balzacian hundreds of princesses and coachmen! I
rather wish that she had written the novel!]
61
[Solovyoff, however, was terribly scared and replied with the following letter, produced
by Madame J elihovsky (p.316):
Helena Petrovna, You are too wise a woman to yield to the furious madness in which you wrote the
letter of yesterday, headed Confession. If I were really your personal enemy, I should now have awaited
with triumph your appearance in Paris and London, and should coolly have looked on at your fall, which
can in no way do me any harm; for ever since I have known you I have acted with knowledge. Every step
of mine with regard to you, every word that I have spoken or written to you, points straight to my goal, in
which there is no discredit to me, as a Russian or a Christian.
This goal as you know I have reached; it was not for nothing that I passed six weeks in fetid Wurzburg.
Can you really imagine that it is possible to scare me by impudent slanders and falsehood, and that I have
not ready for you in any event for I have always expected anything of you a tolerable collection of
surprises of all sorts? It is you yourself who are your worst enemy, and you do not know what you are
doing, and on what your are rushing; I know perfectly well what I am doing, and what will happen,
though I have none of your Mahatmas to incite me . . . You see I have a cool head, as you yourself said;
while yours is hot beyond belief, and when it is once fired, you simply see nothing . . .
Do you want a scandal? You have had little enough already? Very well, if you please, you are welcome.
And so we will set to work . . .
I have nothing more to say to you. I am far, very far, from being your enemy, and I give you my best
wishes, especially for your tranquillity, far from all these agitations.
If you compare yourself with a wild boar, and want to bite very well; the traps are ready. Pardon this
tone. It is yours, not mine.
Vs. Solovyoff.
Madame Blavatsky read only one way. Solovyoff was not her enemy, he was far from
wishing anything but her tranquillity. He said so; and why should one say so if one did
not mean it? Before the day was out, she probably told herself that she was to blame for a
misunderstanding; that Solovyoff was sore about being neglected by the masters and was
anxious not to get embroiled in the Mohini affair; a complication of different feelings
had made him dash off his letter telling her he knew a lot of scandal about her. She was
used to scandalous reports, was in the thick of them, the S. P. R. Report above all. One
more or less . . . one friend more or less biting . . . this one, evidently, only barked but
had no desire to bite. . . . he was not her enemy, he wished her tranquillity . . .
The very word must have been balm to her at that period when the hounds and the wild
beasts who had been friends were doing their best to kill her! Countess Wachtmeister
writes to Sinnett:
Do you know that ever since the 1st J anuary (issue of the S.P.R. report), my first thought on waking in
the morning has been what impertinence or annoyance will the post bring today, and a feeling of
thankfulness on going to bed if there has been nothing, which is very rare. J ust imagine what a life to
lead, particularly for one in bad health, constantly suffering, and has to write the Secret Doctrine. I tell
you the book does not progress and cannot progress with such constant persecutions.
62
But the book did progress. There was behind it a will-power such as even genius rarely
creates. Before a month was out, she was writing to Sinnett:
Theres a new development and scenery every morning. I live two lives again. Master finds that it is too
difficult for me to be looking consciously into the astral light for my S.D. and so, it is now about a
fortnight, I am made to see all as I have to as though in my dream. I see large and long rolls of paper on
which things are written and I recollect them. Thus all the Patriarchs from Adam to Noah were given me
to see parallel with the Rishis; and in the middle between them the meaning of their symbols or
personifications. Seth standing with Brighu for first sub-race of the Root race for inst: meaning
anthropologically first speaking human sub-race of the 3rd Race . . . .
What a distance from Solovyoff! from coulombs and Hodgsons and the whole pack! But
we must get back to Solovyoff. She wrote to him, asking in her way what she had done to
him to account for his letter of threats and treacheries.
And what have I done to you? I am ready to forget all to-morrow and to love you as of old, because I
have no spite in me, and because you are a Russian a sacred thing for an exile like me.
And the incredible truth is that she meant it! She would have received him again . . no
doubt, this astounding genius, who baffles all the ordinary science of psychology, had an
unfathomable contempt for folk in general, too deep for her own consciousness, and
short perhaps of the devil in person, her door would never have been quite shut.
But Solovyoff was busy with his friend Myers restoring himself to the company of the
respectable: those who know that occultism is all a fraud and are so uncertain of their
own position that they count no time wasted in exposing psychic persons whose
phenomenal performances escape explanation except on the basis of fraud! In fifty years,
these so-called psychical researches have compiled vast volumes, but they have added
nothing to the worlds knowledge of phenomena. The veriest little medium who does a
few lines of genuine automatic writing is of more practical use than they.
Solovyoff retired to Dinant to nurse a sick head and there Myers came to receive
information. How the psychists must have urged the prodigal son to publish
something, a something to correct the profound impression that had been made by his
Elberfeld vision. All they could get him to say was that he did not now believe that the
vision was anything but an hallucination. He must, just in time, have withdrawn his
resignation from the S. P. R., as this was not published in the next proceedings, and he
resigned certainly from the Theosophical Society, but this only in Feb. 1886, having
joined in May, 1884. But he published, against or for, not a word about Madame
Blavatsky. He went off to Russia, and we know little more of him. It was only in 1892,
after her death, that the Russian public was treated to what he made of The Plain Tale.
HOW SOLOVYOFF PERVERTED
THE PLAIN TALE I.
[He prepares the Russian reader to accept him as an apostle of Christianity.]
Since my return to Russia to this day, I have not written a word about Madame Blavatsky and her
Theosophical Society. I have held it worse than useless to allude to this anti-Christian movement, so long
63
as it remained a matter that was little known in Russia. I kept to myself all I knew, and the documentary
evidence I possessed, against the time when a panegyric of Madame Blavatsky might appear in the
Russian press, and with it, in one form or another, the propaganda of her name and her newest theosophy.
One thing only I desired: that such a time might never come, and that I might be absolved from the moral
duty of again alluding to the question.
Hitherto it has been possible for me to keep silence. But the lengthy articles of Madame J elihovsky, in
which she proclaims her sister, not without grounds, a universal celebrity, and speaks of the new
religion preached and created by her as a pure and lofty doctrine, are in fact the propaganda in Russia
of this pure and lofty doctrine and of the name of its apostle. These articles . . . cannot but interest our
public, credulous as it is and prone to every sort of new doctrine . . . In these circumstances to keep
silence and to hide the truth, if one knows it, becomes a crime. I therefore find myself compelled to break
silence about my intimate knowledge of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and her society.
He refers to Colonel Olcott contemptuously as Colonel Olcott. The President of the
United States autographed a letter recommending Colonel Olcott to American officials
abroad. He refers to Madame Blavatsky contemptously as Madame. Miss E. Holt tells
us that so early as 1873, Madame Blavatsky was called simply Madame by her American
friends who seem to have hesitated at her Russian name; the Indians later took the same way out of a
difficulty, and everyone came to call her Madame, even the Parisians. She preferred to be called H.P.B.
and thus she was usually spoken of by intimates.
[With the way thus prepared for himself as a moral man doing a most painful duty to
Christian Russia and for Olcott and Madame Blavatsky as doubtful characters, Solovyoff
proceeds.]
II.
[Prudently, like Madame Coulomb, he gives few dates. He says that he was living in
Paris in May, 1884 and saw in the Matin among the news of the day a misleading
announcement that H. P. Blavatsky had arrived a day or two before. Such a notice may
exist, but I have not found it. It would be absurdly wrong, however, for she had arrived in
Paris long since on March 29th, and on April 1st, Le Rappel had an article about the
Theosophical Society, not the arrival of Madame B., but the meetings. Le Temps
followed next day. Le Matin had about half a column article on the 21st announcing
arrival of Theosophists from all parts to meet in Paris. Solovyoff mentions none of these
papers but affects to have been shocked by this short paid-for puff in the Matin
(naturally he does not quote it in full) a vulgar reclame inserted if not by herself, then in
all probability by the efforts of one of her nearest friends and associates, with the
obvious intention of attracting the absent visitors, and spreading her notoriety in Paris.
(p.21). As seen, he was so shocked that he immediately wrote off to his friend in Russia
to procure him a letter of introduction to Madame Blavatsky, not venturing even to call
on his famous compatriote till he had first received her consent. (p.2). He apparently
knew nobody in Paris; but the truth was that he was not only financially on his beam
ends but had eloped from Russia with his wifes sister and was thus doubly barred from
knocking at the doors of official Russian circles.
[The papers had been, and continued, full of the Theosophists and their doings and no
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paid reclame was at all necessary. On May 10th, the Duchesse de Pomar gave a
conversazione. The Paris correspondent of the London World wrote on May 11th:
Embarras de choix. Last night, Anbemon, who used to be called la precieuse radicale
when Papa Thiers was the chief ornament of her salon, offered a grand amateur theatrical
performance, with half the French academy and all elegant and literary Paris in the
audience; the Countess of Caithness, Duchesse de Pomar, President of the Societ
Theosophique dOrient et dOccident, offered something far more novel, namely, a
Theosophical conversazione, at which were present that amiable arch-sorceress and
profound metaphysician, Madame Blavatsky . . . Hesitation was out of the question, the
attraction of high magic and occult science was irresistible, the more so as the Brocken,
in this case, was one of the most sumptuous and luxurious mansions of the Faubourg St
Germain.
[This was not the first of the grand Faubourg events. The Duchess had presided at a
meeting at her house on May 4th and Gil Blas writes of an introduction to Madame
Blavatsky on May 6th: When I heard of Theosophy I smiled, expecting later to have a
good laugh at it . . . The Duchesse de Pomar invited me to her splendid hotel . . .
Madame Blavatsky was there. She has an aristocratic look in spite of an air de bon
garcon. Her dress is peculiar, a black and loose gown, something like a childs sarran or
a priests robe . . . Mdme Blavatsky in this aristocratic hotel and with that easiness . . . of
a grand lady from Russia, was smoking light cigarettes and trying to present Theosophy
to me as an attractive theory. All religions are alike, she said, one is copied on the other.
The essence is the same: Dogma has killed the gospel. The priest has killed religion.
This is the reason why we accept members of all sects. But we refuse neither materialists
nor atheists. Why? because we believe that everything, even the supernatural, may be
explained by science. Those who lean on pure and abstract science are with us. Our
Masters would reason with them on miracle as with a theorem of geometry. Gil Blas
writes: I have laughed at Theosophy, but I laugh no more.
The surest way to get among this society was to present oneself as an earnest seeker with
a deep spiritual problem to solve; and this was the way Solovyoff took. Soon, we hear no
more of his spiritual problem, only of his financial and domestic problems. Yet, he had a
psychical, if not a spiritual problem. He soon proved to be a medium, both clairvoyant
and clairaudient; he had long been dipping into spiritualism and was now dipping into
mysticism and occultism, looking for materials for a novel. Perhaps he even fancied that
all this was really a spiritual problem of a high order, the person concerned being named
Solovyoff? He was soon to exhibit the conceit of imagining that if only he, he himself,
were to be furnished with the means of convincing the world, that world would be con
vinced. It was a not uncommon notion among the followers of Madame Blavatsky.
He was rudely disappointed to find H.P.B. in a mere flat in the Rue Notre Dame des
Champs; an unsightly house, with a very very dark staircase, and not a single
carriage at the door. And a slovenly figure in an oriental turban admitted me to a tiny
dark lobby. Whether or no the house were dark and unsightly Babula was the pink of
Hindu servants, whom the Duchesse delighted to parade on her carriage next to the
coachman and who was just home from a visit, as attendant on H.P.B., to the
country-house of the comtesse dAdhemar where, as in other houses, he waited in the
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drawing-room. But Solovyoff means to make him ungodly as well as uncleanly: A most
consummate rascal; a glance at his face was enough to convince one of this. Several
thousand persons must have glanced at his face since he became attached to Madame
Blavatsky and no-one else, even Sinnett and Hume in Simla, and accustomed to
Hindu faces, ever discovered the arch-villain in his features. Poor Babula! he was
considered fair game by both Mme. Coulomb and Hodgson of the S.P.R., who
conveniently introduce him as the confederate of Madame Blavatsky on any occasion
when neither of the Coulombs could possibly have been present to help her with the
tricks.
[The person whom Solovyoff omits to mention is the American lawyer, W. Q. J udge;
J udge is not even named. This falsifies immediately the story, for J udge was a guest in
the house and was revising Isis Unveiled under Madame Blavatskys direction. But
J udge would have defended himself; and he was still alive when Solovyoff wrote.
Incidentally, Hodgson also was very careful not even to name J udge; Babula was the
man, poor low caste Indian!
Solovyoff omits also to mention the companion of his domestic troubles and this falsifies
enormously; throughout, he represents himself as a free lance with all his time to
himself; but, as we have seen (p.309), the lady was such a karma that he admits to
H.P.B. the necessity of meeting her somewhere in Italy accidentally so to speak. And
this brings us to the general question of time.
[Solovyoff says that he first called on H.P.B. four days before Olcott arrived in Paris. He
continues the narrative as though Olcott were there all the time, up to H.P.B.s departure
on J une 17th or 18th at latest, and portraits of the Masters having been begun in London
on J une 19th and finished J uly 9th, as Olcott notes in Old Diary Leaves, Vol. 3. p.156.
Madame Blavatsky was present at the first sitting, and Mrs. Holloway has left a vivid
account of Schmiechens first strokes on the canvas. (In the S.P.R. First Report, p.601
the testimony to the letter phenomenon of J une 11th is dated J une 21st, clearly a
misprint. The document was drawn up immediately after the phenomenon took place;
moreover, Olcott and J udge who signed, left Paris on J une 13th.)
[Now, Olcott made a trip from London to Paris on May 18th and was back by the 20th.
H.P.B.s aunt and sister were already there, for Vera mentions a conversation that took
place with Olcott on the 18th (Incidents in the life of Madame Blavatsky, (p.265). Olcott
returned to Paris on J une 1st and left again with J udge on the 13th. As all the real
(confirmed) events mentioned by Solovyoff took place while Olcott was in the house, it
looks as if Solovyoffs first acquaintance with Madame Blavatsky only dated from May
30th to J une 17th. He has so vaguely woven his narrative that his events cannot be made
to fit the dates at all, the which is very convenient for himself. He speaks of Mohini as
being there when he first called. Mohini was in London at an S.P.R. meeting on May
28th and went to Paris with Keightley next day. Olcott followed on J une 1st; so this
gives only two days, not four, before Solovyoff, as he says, first met Olcott. The whole
aim of Solovyoff is to make out that he spent two whole months in Madame Blavatskys
company, seeing her intimately almost every day and thus had ample opportunity to find
her out. As, however, the events simply will not fit his chronology, but do fit the known
66
dates, I take it that his visits were between May 30th and J une 17th; during which period,
Madame Blavatsky was engaged with her Theosophical Society, lectures, visits to and
from the Duchesse de Pomar, Comtesse dAdhemar, Mme. de Morsier, Mme. de Barrau
and the rest of the members; with her relatives; with Olcott, Mohini, Keightley,
Cooper-Oakley; with Parisian visitors including Professor Richet two or three times,
Flammarion and others; with Mrs. Holloway from America; with people from London
and Germany and above all with J udge and the revision of Isis Unveiled, as well as
the translation into French of this book of two big volumes. What time had she for
Solovyoff? There is not one single scrap of evidence that he ever had a private interview with her after
his first call. It is clear that he could not have been shown the Matin of April 21st, with the news of the
day about Madame Blavatsky, for he was not in Paris until some time in May, and it is probable that the
newspaper accounts of the conversazione held on May 10th at the Duchesse de Pomars were his first
incitement to write to St. Petersburg for a good introduction to Madame Blavatsky.]
III.
[Solovyoff joins the Theosophical Society. I give a sample of him at his most novelistic;
one sample will do for the whole book, and is indeed sufficient to advise anyone familiar
with Madame Blavatskys style that he was not even a good novelist, for he cannot
invent a likely speech. He says that when he announced his intention of joining, she
brightened up. Ah, how kind you are, indeed! I, as you know, am never importunate,
and if you yourself had not expressed the desire, I should never have proposed it. Broad
comedy only should use that sort of simpleton patter! This as you know to a stranger,
is clumsy invention indeed! To whom, ever, did H.P.B. speak in this fashion?
But there was worse to come, Solovyoff writes; Mohini, now acknowledging me as his brother, began
to tell me about his guru, Mahatma Koot Hoomi, and how he had that morning had the honour of
receiving a letter from, containing replies to questions put by himself alone.
[In what language was this conversation? Solovyoff did not speak English and Mohini
did not know enough French to be able to make his way home from a railway-station
(p.98)
The Hindu spoke of this phenomenon with the greatest reverence; but far from believing it, I only felt a
longing to get out at once into a purer atmosphere.
IV.
[This chapter is concocted to convince the Russian reader that Madame Blavatsky was
almost ignored by Paris, left alone in her little dark house with the slovenly servant. We
need not waste space on that, but it is curious that Solovyoff was never invited to the
Pomar house or to Comtesse dAdhemars where H.P.B. often drove out to dine. Perhaps
the awkward situation of his lady companion obliged him to refuse invitations? After all,
he would have met Russian officials in the Faubourg and risked being cut dead. Or
perhaps, being of no particular interest to Madame Blavatsky, and having become an
impertinent bit of a bore with his pesterings for occult instruction, as the letters indicate,
she never put him on the list of guests to be invited.]
V.
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[Olcott arrives. Solovyoff adds to his description a detail that nobody else ever noted.
Sinnett says that Olcott had a slight cast in one eye, so slight as to be almost
unnoticeable. Solovyoff writes: The fact is that one of his eyes was extremely
disobedient, and from time to time used to turn in all directions . . . suddenly something
twitched, the eye got loose and began to stray suspiciously and knavishly, and
confidence vanished in a moment. Like Babulas villainy that was to be seen at a glance
by Solovyoff alone! It does not say much for the scores of American and English
officials with whom Olcott had dealings that they retained their confidence in him when
this eye alone should have been enough to show them a knave. Lord Derby had several
interviews with him just at this very time regarding the successful Buddhist Mission . . .
[Then comes the phenomenon of the letter. In the First (Private and Confidential)
Report of the S.P.R., p.120, is an account of this phenomenon, taken from Light of J uly
12th, 1884. This account, like so much else that tells heavily in favour of Madame
Blavatsky is omitted from the Second (Hodgsons) Report. Above many of the
Appendices to the First Report we find remarks inserted apparently late in the day, all
tending to make it appear that the S.P.R. Committee had never been taken in by Madame
Blavatsky and had been quite wide-awake from the first like Solovyoff. These
remarks seem to be all by the same hand, and they frequently pass all that Madame
Coulomb herself ever wrote for absurdity.]
VI.
[Solovyoff describes a phenomenon done with a locket. As his is the only version, with
no confirmation, I ignore it here; it will have its place in some future article on the
controversy between Solovyoff and Mme. J elihovsky, merely remarking that she proves
him once more a liar.]
VII.
[This is mainly taken up with the alleged conversation with Mme. J . in the Parc
Monceau. Solovyoff writes: As for Madame Blavatsky herself, after the conversation
with Madame J ., I definitely promised myself that come what might I would see through
this woman. Now we have him definitely declaring himself to be henceforth a detective.
The Plain Tale shows that he was nothing of the sort, but a would-be yogi.]
VIII.
[He starts off his sleuthic literary career with a yarn definitely borrowed from Madame
Coulomb, but adorned with his own most particular lying, foolish lying.
Miss X and Madame Y [Madame Fadeev and Mme. J elihovsky] said to me one day: That Babula is
most amusing . . . He has a droll way of telling us all that goes on at Adyar. Yes, and when I ask him,
continued Madame Y., if he has seen the Mahatmas, he laughs and says: I have often seen them.
What are they like? I ask and he answers: They are fine! he says, Muslin? and then he laughs
again.
This conversation seemed to have a certain interest of its own, and I noted it down at the time; and when
talking to Helena Petrovna I advised her, with a laugh, to send Babula off at once. Mark my words, I
said, you will have some scandal with him yet; he is not at all trustworthy. She said nothing in reply,
68
and I do not even know if she grasped the sense of my words.
[How kind of the spy who was collecting evidence! We hardly need Madame
J elihovskys denial of such a ridiculous story, but she writes: I faithfully declare on my
conscience that there never was a word said about muslin Mahatmas. Had he ever used
such a phrase, I should never, in my then state of incredulity as to the existence of these
Hindu sages, have left it unnoticed, but should have questioned both Babula and his
mistress, with whom I never hesitated to enter on dispute.
[If this had ever happened, it would be just about the time Solovyoff was writing to the
Rebus. Into such swamps of his own making falls a man who sets out on the impossible
task of making a coherent tale of a mixture of truth and lies. It will be worse when we
come to documents.]
IX.
Madame Blavatsky left for London. From time to time I corresponded with her, and while expressing in
my letters an involuntary liking and sympathy for herself personally, I none the less held steadily to my
aim, and said to myself: I will not stop till I know what she and her phenomena really are. Of course I
did not expect that she would at once, especially in her letters, speak out and betray herself; but I already
knew enough of her to reckon on her constant little slips, which when fitted together would form
something great and palpable.
[Disgusting hound! But his own little slip was to forget that he had written to Vera the
letter about the raps all around him and the invisible voices. And no doubt he thought
that his letter to H.P.B. about the storm his article in the Rebus had raised was safely
burned.
I am not afraid of ridicule, I am indifferent to the titles of fool, madman, etc. But why do you renounce
me? . . . I cannot think that any master (Mahatma) has told you that you have made a mistake, and that I
am not necessary to you.
[This chapter includes Solovyoffs visit to Elberfeld, given at length in the Plain Tale,
where the Master took a look at him, and never looked again. But it will be many long
months before Solovyoff will be able to believe himself rejected.]
X.
[This chapter on the portraits of the Masters is also given in the Plain Tale. Solovyoff
continues his interweaved insults to Olcott and others, splashing on the colour to suit his
pretended sleuthic role. However, he has to explain away what the public knew, namely,
that he had described the Mahatmas visit for the S.P.R. He says that he lost his head, his
dream and delusion had been so vivid. He lost it for some time, for we shall hear of
him, more than a year later, writing angry letters to Myers and insisting on the reality of his vision.]
XI.
[Myers arrives at Elberfeld. At this time, Myers was still a member of the Theosophical
Society inclined to believe, and still insistent on fairness towards Mme. Blavatsky.
69
He begged me in the first place to tell him how I had seen Mahatma Morya, and when I had done so he
began to urge me to communicate the fact to the London society (S. P. R.) in writing.
[Solovyoff then describes a conversation, of which Myers was obliged later to deny an
important part. Solovyoff makes himself remark that the very existence of these
Mahatmas is to me quite problematical. I do not know if you are right, said Myers;
that will be seen from our further investigations. [!] In any case, your communication,
by the rule of our society, must consist only of a simple detailed account of facts, without
any commentaries or criticisms of your own.
[Solovyoffs translator, Walter Leaf, corrects, no doubt with a sigh: Mr. Myers can
certainly not have said that by the rules of the S.P.R. the narrative must not be
accompanied by any commentaries or criticisms, as no such rule exists. Solovyoffs
version seems to be a garble of the facts that he did thoroughly believe in the vision and
wished to write as enthusiastically and positively as in the Rebus. There was nothing to
prevent him from being as positive as he chose, and his account is positive. For some
reason, the S.P.R. omitted it from their First Report, published in Dec. 1884, but it
appears in the Second Report of Dec. 1885. This is sufficiently good evidence that, up to
the time this Second and final, Report went to the press (that is after Solovyoff left
Wurzburg, went to Paris and convinced Richet of Madame Blavatskys powers)
Solovyoff was sticking to his guns. Moreover, this communication about the vision was
only dealt with by Mrs. Sidgwick at the very end of the Report. Things must have been
run pretty close; Solovyoff from St. Petersburg must have been able to save the situation
only just in time before the printer sent the last proofs, for Mrs. Sidgwick scrambles in a
note: Since writing the above I have learned that, owing to events that have since
occurred, Mr. Solovyoff no longer regards his experiences as affording any evidence of
occult power. No longer. Solovyoff says
In the Report of the London Society for Psychical Research my experience is inserted; and though in
obedience to the rules of the society, I do not myself analyze it, yet I do not in any way admit its reality.
The society moreover, considered it to be a vivid dream, and declared that I do not regard it as affording
any evidence of occult agency.
The unhappy Mr. Leaf was obliged also to correct this version of Mrs. Sidgwicks
remark. Solovyoff should have shown his shufflings to the S.P.R. before foisting them in
print on his Russian readers, then these little mishaps would not have occurred. It was
one thing to allow him to say whatever he pleased about Madame Blavatsky, but quite
another to let him juggle with the rules and with the cold print of the S.P.R. Proceedings.
Hence all these tears. What the S.P.R. failed to point out was that the juggler with Myers
and Mrs. Sidgwick was at least equally likely to juggle with Blavatsky and that all his
testimony should be most rigidly examined. Mr. Leaf saved this kind of observation to
apply it to Mme. J elihovsky when, in defending her sisters name, she made a slip; and I
am not certain yet that it was a slip. I hope to find time and space to deal with the
incident in an appendix.]
XII.
[This chapter contains the five letters from H.P.B. reproduced in full in the Plain Tale.
70
Solovyoff, enchanted with the post-script in blue pencil, signed K.H., a proof that he
was not cast off entirely, although the inflexible M. had taken no more notice of him,
had, as he wrote to H.P.B., produced a sensation among the other Theosophists.
[It is to be noted how frequently K.H. continued to wrestle with the J osephs long after
M. had turned his back on them as mere ambitious snobs with a complex about great
identities. To the end, it was M.s favours that Solovyoff coveted, forgetting the big
stick of this Master. Solovyoff has to explain away his enthusiasm witnessed by so
many people in Paris.]
I was so irritated by Koot Hoomis astral post-script that at the first moment I was inclined to appeal at
once to Madame Blavatsky to forget all about my existence. But I should have repented it if I had
followed this first impulse; that very day at Madame de Morsiers, I met the most convinced and honest
of the French theosophists; and they, in spite of all the obviousness of the deception, admitted the
post-script to be the authentic work not of Madames hand but of Koot Hoomis. This absolute
blindness on the part of people who were perfectly rational in everything but the question of Madames
impeccability, forced me finally to adhere to my original plan. Whatever came I would collect such
proofs of all these deceptions as should be sufficient not only for me but for all these blind dupes.
[The truth is that at that time, he had no plan and never said or wrote one word to warn
anyone. On the contrary, the note he had received from K.H. at Elberfeld (p.84) of which
he makes no mention and now this blue-pencilled post-script gave him such a sense of
importance that he began to boss the Theosophists! He replied to H.P.B. begging her not
to resign, to come and talk over the troubles with him, not to get agitated in the name of
all the saints, etc.
He works at the French translation of Isis Unveiled, ropes in Madame de Morsier to
correct mistakes, declares that the Duchess must pay for the publication, without fail, for
the benefit of the French, her plain duty; he passes a whole day with Olcott and Gebhard,
although he can hardly stand on his legs, wants Oakley over to go and tell the Duchess to
pay. He resists all Madame J elihovskys adjurations and sends her a copy of his account
of his experiences, says that he sees in the mere fact that H.P.B. is able to travel a proof
of the existence of the Mahatmas, reminds her of the marvellous way he received the
K.H. note at Elberfeld.
[Be it noted by all the world and the S.P.R. that Solovyoffs communication to the S.P.R.
was signed on Oct. 1st and sent on or after that day. On the 26th he had written to
Madame Blavatsky about the Branch troubles in Paris, reproaching her with not trusting
him and offering to do goodness knows what to bring her out clear from the Elberfeld
rows (of which he really could know nothing but gossip, very complicated rows they
were). On Monday, Sep. 29th, he received her letter about the Coulomb scandal, the
letter with the post-script. He replied the same day saying that he will make a sensation
with this post-script at Mme. de Morsiers, which he did, and begging her not to resign
but to come and talk over things with him. On Wednesday, Oct. lst, he signed and
presumably posted his article to the S.P.R.
[I think that at this point the jury would throw the case out and recommend the lying
71
accuser, Solovyoff, to the Public Prosecutor. But we must continue. Although this
incident alone is sufficient to prove that his book is a fake, we must go on to those
events at Wnrzburg that Professor Sidgwick found so entertaining.]
XIII - XV.
(These chapters, Mr. Leaf says, contained an abridgment of Hodgsons Report against
Madame Blavatsky and her phenomena. Solovyoffs account is not translated, except for
one passage where he completely dishes Hodgsons Russian spy theory.
H. P. Blavatsky was not a spy; and this I say, not because I believe her incapable of playing such a part,
but because, in the autumn of 1885 (i.e., at the time when Hodgsons investigation was completed, and
his report, with all its contents, was being printed), she was extremely anxious to become a secret agent
of the Russian Government in India. If she wished to become, it is plain that up to that time she was not.
How I learned this I will relate in the proper place.
The boot was on the other foot. Solovyoff proposed to her to do secret work in India. H.
P. B. immediately told Sinnett about this. Solovyoffs concern to put the blame on her
may have been due to the circumstance that a gentil-homme de la chambre had no
business to be meddling with the Secret Service and also to the fact that the Russian
nobility held this service in abhorrence. H.P.B. wrote to Sinnett: Solovyoff will not
forgive me for rejecting his propositions that you know. To Vera: I am publicly
accused of being a Russian spy, and this is made the motive of all the (supposed)
fraudulent phenomena and of my invention of the Mahatmas! I, a dying woman, am
turned out of India just on account of such a silly accusation, which, in spite of its
silliness, might have ended in prison and exile, solely because I am a Russian; and
though I have already suffered from this calumny, and do not understand the A B C of politics, I am made to offer
To Solovyoff! To him whom I know for an incorrigible gossip and tale-bearer . . . . And so I want to be
hanged, do I?
Sinnett, in Early Days of Theosophy, p.86 (book none too friendly to H.P.B.) writes of
the loyal tone she really had always adopted in speaking to Indian natives about the
British rule. She warned them of the folly of wishing to exchange this for Russian rule,
which she plainly told them would be a dismal change for the worse.
[Leaf remarks regarding all this: Mr. Solovyoffs own evidence, far from condemning
Mr. Hodgson, will probably be regarded as strong testimony to the acumen of his general
view of Madame Blavatsky; and will remove the feeling, entertained by many at the
time, that he had on this one point done her an injustice. For on her own statement, as
given in chap. xx, she had some years before actually offered her services as a secret
agent to the Russian Government . . . Mr. Hodgson thus came very near the truth.
I have remarked several times in various books during this Defence of Madame
Blavatsky that people who attack her seem to lose their mental balance. Of course, as
they are all lying and juggling and conspiring, there is no wonder. Hodgsons view was
not a general view of his, it was his particular view that Madame Blavatsky invented
the Mahatmas to conceal her machinations with confederates as a Russian spy. He
rejected every other motive. It is n o t her own statement in chap. xx, that Madame
72
Blavatsky had offered her services but the statement of Solovyoff that she had said so
to him. To pass on a she said as evidence is the venomous method of poison-gossips.
Leaf exhibits this kind of cunning frequently, the unintelligence that must immediately
be found out under cross-examination. There is a bad day coming for the S.P.R. when
some lawyer will make a world-reputation and a fortune by an exposure en rgle of the
Blavatsky case.]
XVI.
This chapter is given in the Plain Tale plus the letters Solovyoff suppressed. He feigns to
have suggested to Madame de Morsier that our poor madame has been found out by
Hodgson, but that Mme. de M. was not yet quite ready to admit Madame Blavatskys
guilt. Actually, at the moment, he was busy making the acquaintance of Crookes and
Sinnett and writing to her: All is arranged and prepared to overwhelm, here at least
that is in the Paris press all this rabble of Coulombs and all the asses, to what learned
society they may belong, who could for a moment pay attention to her (Mme.
Coulombs) abominable pamphlet.
[The asses were the S.P.R., of course, but it is a great libel on the quadruped who never
yet conspired to destroy a human being.]
XVII.
[Solovyoff goes to Switzerland, meets Madame de Morsier, and H.P.B. comes there with
Mary Flynn and Babaji.]
XVIII.
This is the first of the three chapters that Professor Sidgwick noted as so important as a
supplement to the S.P.R. inquiry.
The time is important. Madame Blavatsky arrived in Wurzburg on the 17th of August.
Dr. Hartmann, who had found her rooms, was there to settle her in, how long he stayed is
not known. Solovyoff omits to mention Hartmann. Solovyoff himself was there by the
29th. He says: The time had now come for me to set about my investigation in earnest. I
settled myself in Rugmers Hotel . . . . and all the time that I did not spend in sleeping,
eating and walking about the town, I passed with Madame Blavatsky.
He omits to say that his lady companion, whom he now introduced as his wife, had
joined him, bringing a child of the union.
At this time, the Sinnetts were on their way to a visit to the Gebhards in Elberfeld and
intended to visit Madame Blavatsky. On April 19th, H.P.B. wrote to Sinnett: Solovyoff
is so indignant that he has sent in his resignation to the S.P.R. He wrote a long letter to
Myers and now the latter answers him . . begs him not to resign and asks him whether he
still maintains that what he saw at Elberfeld was not a hallucination or a fraud; and
finally begs him to come and meet him at Nancy where he will prove to him my guilt!
Solovyoff says that since he is placed by their Report, as so many others between
choosing to confess himself either a lunatic or a confederate he considers it a slap on
the face, a direct insult to him and answers Myers demanding that his letter should be
73
published and resignation made known. He intends stopping here at Wurzburg with me
for a month or so, with his wife and child.
The Report mentioned is not what is known as the First Report but was a provisional
kind of report by Hodgson that had been read out to a meeting of the S.P.R. on May 24th,
1885; it was received with contempt and disgust not only by all the Theosophists but
many others. When Solovyoff met Sinnett and Crookes in Paris, this was the subject of
discussion, the great magnus opus of the asses. The Theosophists decided to ignore
this report as beneath notice; but between May and December, Hodgson worked on it
and, as Sinnett wrote in his brilliant The Occult World Phenomena (a work
treacherously neglected by the majority of the leading Theosophists to this day): Mr.
Hodgson has employed the time during which his Report has been improperly witheld in
endeavouring to amend and strengthen it so as to render it better able to bear out the
Committees endorsement of the conclusions he reached before he obtained the evidence
he now puts forward. The time was not lost, however, it was employed also in every
kind of propaganda to prepare the public to swallow anything that might be said of
Madame Blavatsky.
Madame Blavatsky fell very ill. This must have been after 20th, for that day she was not
ill. Suppose she were only ill three days, this brings us to the 23rd at least. The next day
she wrote for hours, gnashing her teeth. Solovyoff, all this time, with this woman in
agony, was spying and trying to trap her. So he says. It is a lie but that is what he says
about himself. For the next couple of days I had a feeling as I looked at her that she was
on the point of producing some sort of phenomenon. And so it turned out.
This couple of days would bring us to the 26th. On the 27th at latest, Madame Fadeev
arrived from Russia. Yet, the whole of the events of these three chapters is alleged to
have happened after Madame Blavatskys recovery and before the arrival of her aunt!
From Solovyoffs book one would imagine that many many days were at his disposal for
his trapwork. He says, One morning I called, etc. Again: Madame Blavatsky was still
suffering severely, but she was now able to walk about a little in her room. In spite of her
illness, she was working double tides; she was finishing an article for the Russky
Vyestnik, writing some fanciful stories translating something for her Theosophist and
preparing to begin her Secret Doctrine. Another point I have noticed in all the enemies
of H.P.B. They all, at moments, write as if compelled; automatically they tell the truth,
although the truth defeats them, destroys their case. We see clearly what the genius of
Madame Blavatsky was employed with; she was not thinking of Solovyoff! Yet he says
of this double-tide writer: Meanwhile in her complete isolation, she was depressed, and
could not do without me . . . Every day when I came to see her she used to try to do me a
favour in the shape of some trifling phenomenon, but she never succeeded.
[I leave it to writers, for the moment.]
But these one days and nows and every-days wont do at all. There could not possibly
have been more than two days on which, for a short time, between her writings, Madame
Blavatsky entertained Solovyoff. According to him, there interludes sufficed to produce
all the evidence he needed to convict her!
74
[Let us begin from where he called one morning.]
Helena Petrovna sat behind her great writing-table in an arm-chair of unusual dimensions, sent her as a
present by Gebhard from Elberfeld.
[Helena Petrovna had had no communication with Gebhard since Novmeber, 1884.
There had been a coolness. It was Sinnett who reconciled them when he went to
Gebhards at the end of August, 1885. As late as Sept. 2nd, they were still unreconciled,
for on that day she writes to Mrs. Sinnett about her sadness at the estrangement, says that
Solovyoff himself assured her that the Gebhards had given her up. The dog was never
happy unless making mischief that would leave her all t o himself, to teach him the
powers; from Olcott to Babula, he jealoused everyone around her. But that armchair
was not there then! It was not sent until the Sinnetts had made up the friendship again
between Madame Blavatsky and the Gebhards, and most probably a f t e r the Sinnetts
came to Wurzburg about Sept. 7th.]
At the opposite end of the table stood the dwarfish Babaji with a confused look in his dulled eyes. He
was evidently incapable of meeting my gaze, and the fact certainly did not escape me. In front of Babaji
on the table were scattered several clean sheets of paper. Nothing of the sort had occurred before, so my
attention was the more aroused. In his hand was a great thick pencil. I began to have ideas.
[Why, one asks? What ideas? Because Babaji had paper and pencil?]
. . . . I was walking about the room and did not take my eyes off Babaji. I saw that he was keeping his
eyes wide open, with a sort of contortion of his whole body, while his hand, armed with the great pencil,
was carefully tracing some letters on a sheet of paper.
Look; what is the matter with him? exclaimed Madame Blavatsky.
Nothing particular, I answered; he is writing in Russian.
I saw her whole face grow purple. She began to stir in her chair, with an obvious desire to get up and
take the paper from him. But with her swollen and inflexible limbs, she could not do so with any speed. I
made haste to seize the paper and saw on it a beautifully drawn Russian phrase.
Babaji was to have written, in the Russian language with which he was not acquainted: Blessed are
they that believe, as said the Great Adept. He had learned his task well, and remembered correctly the
form of all the letters, but he had omitted two in the word believe (The effect was precisely the same as
if in English he had omitted the first two and the last two letters of the word.)
Blessed are they that lie, I read aloud, unable to control the laughter that shook me. That is the best
thing I ever saw. Oh, Babaji! you should have got your lesson up better for examination!
The tiny Hindu hid his face in his hands and rushed out of the room; I heard his hysterical sobs in the
distance. Madame Blavatsky sat with distorted features.
75
So you think I taught him this! she exclaimed at last; you think me capable of such arrant folly! It is
the spirit elementals who are making fun of him, poor fellow! And what a vexation for me! My God! as
though I could not have thought of something cleverer than that if I had wanted to deceive you! This is
really too silly.
Why, if Madame Blavatsky had planned the trick, should she have grown purple and
struggled in her chair (which wasnt there) to take the paper from Babaji just when the
trick was succeeding? J ust when Solovyoff anuonced that he was writing in Russian?
In what language did Solovyoff talk to Babaji, who knew scarcely two words of French?
The phrase was in Russian. How could Babaji know that he had made a mistake? Why
should he rush out and sob before the thing could possibly be explained to him? Why
should he sob at all?
It looks as if something not quite of the sort took place. Perhaps Babaji was being taught
Russian by H. P. B. and had written the phrase with a mistake. And Solovyoff invented
the rest. The non-existent armchair and the purple face, and Solovyoffs speech, he who
could not speak English, to Babaji, who could not speak French, are all my eye and Betty
Martin.
Solovyoffs dramatic ingenuity does not stop here. He introduces with a powerful
absence of comment a remarkable Declaration of Madame de Morsier:
Lorsque Bavadje passa Paris, au mois de Septembre il me dit ceci peu prs: A vous on peut tout
dire, je puis bien vous raconter que Madame Blavatsky, sachant quelle ne pouvait gagner M. Solovioff
que par loccultisme, lui promettait toujours de lui enseigner de nouveaux mystres Wurtzbourg et
mme elle venait me demander moi: Mais que puis-je lui dire encore? Bavadjee, sauvez-moi, trouvez
qhelque chose, etc. J e ne sais plus quinventer.
E. de Morsier.
Translation: When Babaji passed through Paris in the month of September he said to me nearly as
follows: One can say everything to you, I can tell you then that Madame Blavatsky, knowing that she
could only secure M. Solovyoff through occultism, was always promising to teach him new mysteries at
Wurzburg and she even came asking me: But what more can I tell him? Babaji, save me, think of
something, etc. I cant invent anything more.
E. de Morsier.
* * *
No date, as usual. I am half inclined to believe the thing a complete forgery, only
hesitating because there is nothing much in it and Solovyoff would have made it quite
incriminating. Yet, it is hard to believe that Madame de Morsier, who on Solovyoffs
own testimony (p.143) had had an affecting parting from Madame Blavatsky only a
month before, and who continued her office in the Society for three months, allowed
Babaji to talk to her in such a manner but never asked Madame Blavatsky for an
explanation. However, Theosophical traitors bred one a day around the woman of genius
whom they, and not the Coulombs, almost broke down, and so, this undated trap signed
de Morsier must be accepted in the absence of any evidence that Solovyoff forged it,
although it would not be accepted in any court.
76
We have to suppose, on no grounds whatever, that Mme. de M. spoke English, as Babaji
knew no French; she was Swiss, the which accounts perhaps for the rather curious
French and the punctuation, and her English, if she knew English, would be
incomparably worse, for she seems to have lived only in Switzerland and France. So, in
any case, we have a report in French of a conversation in English by a lady who was no
adept in either language. (Or, was this poor French Solovyoffs? I still doubt. It is more
than strange that Mme. de M. should spell Babajis name with a v, as Solovyoff himself
does whereas B. always signed with a b and was called Babaji by everyone. It is equally,
and even more, curious that a woman living for long years in France and actually
secretary of the Paris T. S. should write Septembre with a capital S. Had Madame
Blavatsky presented such a document we know what kind of thunder the S.P.R. would
have used. Nothing would surprise me less than to come across some letters of Mme. de
M. spelling Babaji la franais and writing the month as might be expected of a woman
who passed so much of her time in French correspondence. And then, this knowing that
she could only secure M. Solovyoff through occultisme . . . it is almost too good, too
exactly what Solovyoff needed to buttress his own otherwise absolutely unsupported
statements. What evidence there is goes to prove that Madame Blavatsky gave him very
little of her company at any time and her letters treat him only as a Russian friend. There
are no references to any phenomena either performed or contemplated, except the
Elberfeld vision the which was known only through his own revelation. He pestered her
for phenomena and she says that she is sick of phenomena, wants no talk of it. Mme.
J elihovsky states that H.P.B. said she did not know what to do with him and his
importunacy:
He used to besiege her with requests to admit him to her knowledge of particularly convincing
phenomena (p.292).
He only became of any considerable interest to her after the Coulomb scandal when he
espoused her cause against the learned asses and resigned from the S.P.R. Naturally
enough, especially for her, there seemed all reason to make a fuss of him, and quite
probably she promised him at last to try and teach him something. But I doubt whether
there was anything much in her mind, for Solovyoff had already seen, in company with
other people, a great deal of phenomena and needed no more for conviction if he were
going to be convinced. On Solovyoffs showing, she immediately settled to double-tide
work, at Wurzburg, and he forgets to invent even a reasonable conversation on what he
calls the promised phenomena.
And then again . . . was always promising to teach him new mysteries at Wurzburg:
this bears out Solovyoff, but where was Bavaji imagining himself to be standing on the
globe when he heard about this, at Wurzburg or where. And how could he understand
what the two Russians who always spoke either Russian or French were saying?
It gets fishier and fishier . . .
[But after all, the whole accusation only amounts to a cri de coeur by Madame
Blavatsky. What more can I tell him? Babaji, save me from this importunate bore.
Invent something. Im at my wits end. The subtle (or clumsy) etc. allows every length
77
of speculation, but speculation only ends in a wonder why, if Solovyoff fabricated the
document, he did not make it incriminating and above all did not write do instead of
merely tell him. That is my personal sole reason for hesitating to denounce this otherwise
suspect document as a forgery. I believe it to be a forgery.]
XIX.
Madame Blavatsky was still suffering severely, but she was now able to walk about a little in her room.
In spite of her illness, she was working double tides;. Meanwhile, in her complete isolation, she was
depressed, and could not do without me. I was bound, come what might, to make the most of the time, for
as soon as her non-Russian friends arrived she would slip out of my hands. Every day when I came to
see her she used to try to do me a favour in the shape of some trifling phenomenon but she never
succeeded. Thus, one day her famous silver bell was heard, when suddenly something fell beside her on
the ground. I hurried to pick it up and found in my hands a pretty little piece of silver, delicately
worked and strangely shaped. Helena Petrovna changed countenance, and snatched the object from me. I
coughed significantly, smiled and turned the conversation to indifferent matters.
Still; now; every day; one day.
Solovyoff has to make the most of his time, however, for Madame Fadeev will arrive on
the 27th! And he does make the most of it. Everything necessary to his end will happen.
First, the silver bell. He will pick it up, and it actually is a pretty little piece of silver!
But what does the S.P.R. Report say?
Madame Coulomb asserts that they (the astral bells) were actually produced by the use of a small
musical-box, constructed on the same principle as the machine employed in connection with the trick
known under the name Is your watch a repeater? and she produced garments which she asserted had
belonged to Madame Blavatsky, and showed me stains resembling iron-mould on the right side slightly
above the waist, which she affirmed had been caused by contact with the metal of the machine . . . I think
the astral bells maybe thus accounted for. . . (Hodgsons Report, p.263).
Pay your money and take your choice: pretty little silver piece or iron-stains on Madame
Blavatskys chemises stolen by Mme. C. and examined by Hodgson. Solovyoff will have
to cough much more significantly if the patronne of the S.P.R. is to be coughed out with
her musical-box.
Madame Olga Novikoff wrote to Myers in 1884: My dear Mr. Myers, I see no difficulty whatever in
telling you what happened in my presence a few days ago at Mrs. As house, where I had been dining
with Madame Blavatsky. In the midst of conversation, referring to various subjects, Madame Blavatsky
became silent, and we all distinctly heard a sound that might be compared to that produced by a small
silver bell. The same phenomenon was produced later on, in the drawing-room. I was naturally surprised
at this manifestation, but still more by the following incident: I had been singing a Russian song . . . After
the last chord of the accompaniment had died away, Madame Blavatsky said, Listen, and held up her
hand, and we distinctly heard the full chord composed of five notes repeated in our midst.
Should the S.P.R. Report ever serve as stuff for a musical farceand it is rich enough in
situations!this would be the moment for the entry of the Committee, preceded by
Hodgson bearing the Chemise!
78
* * *
We are at the last day before the arrival of Madame Fadeev, this miraculous day of
Solovyoffs triumph, but he brings in another time.
Another time I said that I should like to have some of the real essence of roses made in India.
I am so sorry, she said, I have none with me. But I will not guarantee that you may not receive some
essence of roses from India, such as you speak of, and that very soon.
Watching her from that moment, I distinctly saw her open one of the side drawers of her table and take
something out. Then some half-hour later, after having walked around me, she very gently and cautiously
slipped some little object into my pocket. If I had not watched her every movement, and had not guessed
why it was she kept passing around me, I should probably not have noticed anything.
However, I immediately produced from my pocket a little flat flask, opened it, smelled, and said, This
is not essence of roses, Helena Petrovna, but oil of oranges; your master has made a mistake.
Eh, devil take it! she exclaimed, unable to restrain herself.
Evidently, the stiff and swollen Madame Blavatsky had acquired some agility! But what
a clumsy fool to be called the most ingenious impostor of the age! She lets herself be
seen taking out the flask, then she walks around and around, and lets herself be felt
dropping it into the pocket. First of all, by a speech, she warns her dupe to be on guard.
And she tries to pass off oil of oranges for attar of roses. I am not going to waste time
and space on such rubbish. If anything of the sort ever occurred, Madame Blavatsky must
have been pulling the leg of this man as she sometimes did when people bored her stiff.
At last [italics mine] came the decisive day and hour. H.P.B. told him that her aunt was coming in a
few days. We are at the 26th, although according to Solovyoffs chronology, we should be well into the
next month, and Madame Fadeev came on the 27th at latest.
I am very glad to hear it, I said, and thought to myself: Now there is no time to be lost, while she has
no accomplices, and is still in this humour! At this very moment a lucky chance came to help me.
Astounding as it seems that Solovyoff should dare to insinuate that Madame Fadeev was
an accomplice, he was sure of support from the S. P. R. at least. Hodgson had already
insulted this lady in his Report. Yet, for Solovyoff to do so is almost incredible. She was
widely-known and infinitely respected as a philanthropist and a profound student. Her
friends saw to it that Solovyoff should get his deserts in Russia. He died miserably,
ostracised by the nobility.
The Lucky chance.
Madame Blavatsky was talking about the Theosophist, and mentioned the name of Subba Rao, a Hindu
who had attained the highest degree of knowledge.
79
[H.P. B. certainly never said any such thing.]
And then he has such a wise, wonderful face . . . I wonder if you ever cast your eyes on his face?
I dont remember.
Well, wait a moment; look there, in the table; open the drawer and look, I think there must be a
photograph of him, with me and Babaji.
I opened the drawer, found the photograph, and handed it to her together with a packet of Chinese
envelopes such as I well knew; they were the same in which the elect used to receive the letters of the
Mahatmas Morya and Koot Hoomi by astral post.
Look at that, Helena Petrovna! I should advise you to hide this packet of the masters envelopes
farther off. You are so terribly absent-minded and careless.
It is easy to imagine what this was to her. I looked at her, and was positively frightened; her face grew
perfectly black. She tried in vain to speak; she could only writhe helplessly in her great arm-chair.
[That was not there.]
What is not easy to imagine is that the Sleuth, with the pieces of evidence in his hands,
did not secure even one envelope. But then, this would have engaged him later to
produce it . . . it was safer to represent himself as once more merely giving her good, if
satirical, advice: this is not made of unprocurable Chinese paper. Still, look at him on
this last great day, having before his eyes and gripped in his own hands, those Chinese
envelopes. Madame Blavatsky, gone from purple to black, writhing helplessly in her
chair . . . and what does he do? We do not hear, can only conclude that he put them back
in the drawer!
And a month after this, he convinced Richet!
Countess Wachtmeister writes in Reminiscences of Madame Blavatsky, p.57:
Madame Fadeev H.P.B.s aunt, wrote to her that she was sending a box to
Wurzburg containing what seemed to her a lot of rubbish. The box arrived and to me was
deputed the task of unpacking it. As I took out one thing after another and passed them to
Madame Blavatsky, I heard her give an exclamation of delight, and she said, Come and
look at this that I wrote in the year 1851, the day I saw my blessed Master; and there in
a scrap-book in faded writing, I saw a few lines in which H.P.B. described the above
interview.
H.P.B. must have had a clear conscience about that lurid past the slanderers ascribe to
her to trust a stranger to unpack that old box of letters and documents. G. R. S. Mead
writes in the Memorial, p.75: According to my experience she was ever over-trustful
of others and quite prodigal in her frankness. As an instance, no sooner had I arrived than
she gave me the run of all her papers, and set me to work on a pile of correspondence
80
that would otherwise have remained unanswered till doomsday.
We need not wonder that the Sleuth failed to secure one of those Chinese envelopes in
that drawer: there never were any there.
There is not a scrap of confirmation of all these incidents of the three supplementary and
entertaining chapters to the S.P.R. Report; the paper with the Russian writhing is not
secured and produced; the silver bell vanishes; the oil of oranges evaporates; the Chinese
envelopes go back in the drawer. Anyone who had a mind to it could make up
Solovyoffs story if they were so foolish and wicked, and I do not know which comes
first: or, if they felt secure of such unscrupulous protection as the S.P.R. offered to
Solovyoff.
One is bound to conjecture that he had secured their protection before ever he published
his Russian attack. Otherwise how, knowing that they possessed all the documentary
evidence necessary to convict him of literary imposture, could he have dared to publish?
They had his communication of October 1s 1884, describing the Masters astral visit at
Elberfeld. They knew, therefore, that he lies in chap. xii, where he says that two days
before he sent them this communication for publication, he had definitely promised
himself to collect proofs of all Madame Blavatskys deceptions. They knew that on or
about, September 20th, 1885, he had sent in his resignation to the S.P.R. and a letter of
protest against Hodgsons report; that he had written angry letters to Myers and was
publicly taking the side of Madame Blavatsky; that, therefore, he lies in saying that he
went to Wurzburg for the purpose of trapping her and exposing her. They knew that he
did not withdraw his resignation and protest until some time in November at earliest.
They knew that he went from Wurzburg to Paris towards the end of September and there sought out
Richet: in Richets own words
When I saw you, you said to me, Reserve your judgment, she has shown me things that astound me, my
mind is not quite made up, but I do believe that she is a most extraordinary woman, gifted with
exceptional powers. Wait and I will give you more ample explanations.
When Richet wrote his testimonial to Solovyoff, unless he knew Russian, he could
scarcely have read what Solovyoff had written about Wurzburg,as happening only a
month before. It says long on the timidity of the scientist that he never, publicly anyway,
denounced Solovyoff. But Richet had read the S.P.R. Report . . and he had visited
Blavatsky. It looks as if, sooner than admit to having ever countenanced the impostor
Richet was willing to rope in anyone as aparatonerre, lightning-conductor, and flatter
him for he highly flatters Solovyoff and signs, Yours most affectionately and
paint him white. Even the self-accusing and jet-black Coulombs became grey under the
brush of the S.P.R.
Mais, ce quon peut affectionner en fait dordure . . ! Richet must have been told the gist
of Solovyoffs tale, and must also, have been told that, at the very date Solovyoff allots
to the silver bell and the Chinese envelopes, he was actually resigning from the S.P.R.
Or, was Richet told nothing? Positively, we must conclude so, for it is one thing, for fear
81
of ridicule and damage to ones scientific reputation, to scurry away from a publicly
denounced impostor whom one has visited, but quite another to take part in a
conspiracy to suppress documents that would exonerate the accused person and prove the
accuser an impudent liar. I prefer to suppose that Richet was never told of these
documents. His flattering letter to Solovyoff arouses contempt for his judgment of
character; his failure to perceive in Madame Blavatsky one of the greatest psychics the
world has ever seen, although, as he admits, she had shown him some phenomena, will
always disgrace his reputation as a researcher in metapsychical science: but we need not
go further than that. The S.P.R. deceived the whole world and may well have deceived
Richet too.
What the public may justly demand now is the production of the S.P.R. records with
Solovyoffs 1885 resignation and letter of protest. Through their sponsorship of this
entertaining narrative, and Madame J elihovskys public attack on it we have all the
rest, all the necessary letters and communications and newspaper articles with their
inexorable dates.
* * *
After his envelopes, all Solovyoff had to do was to fit the word to the deed, to make
Madame Blavatsky confess to him her long vast scheme of imposture. He borrows a
choice bit from the S.P.R. First Report. He makes her declaim: How often has it
happened that under my direction and revision minutes of various phenomena have been
drawn up; lo, the most innocent and conscientious people . . . have signed en toutes
lettres at the foot of the Minutes. Yes, my dear sir, I venture to assure you that in history,
even the best attested, there is far more fancy than truth. The style is like none ever
reported elsewhere of Madame Blavatsky. She never talked like that.
First Report, p.8: Many worthy persons . . . would be willing to sign a statement that a
small gas-burner gave a good light when, in point of fact, they could scarcely see their
hands before them. Like Madame Coulomb, Solovyoff frequently dramatizes and makes
an actual happening of some suspicion, sometime, somewhere directed against Madame
Blavatsky, her confederates and her dupes. Frequently, I say; but the bigger half of his
book is made up from such already published materiel de roman. Where he thinks to
improve matters, as with his strangely-shaped pretty piece of silver and his spy yarn, he
improves only the case for Madame Blavatsky! and dishes two nice S.P.R theories
hitherto unchallenged, or at least, undisproved.
[We hear more about that piece of silver. But first, we learn some rather astonishing
things.]
Are you alone the author of Koot Hoomis letters, philosophical and otherwise?
No, the chelas used sometimes to help me, Damodar, Subba Rao and Mohini.
[Probably, even today, if such an accusation against the late Subba Rao were known in
Madras Presidency, there would be meetings of protest against the S.P.R. Of all the cruel
insults to hundreds of good Indian families made in the Report, none equals in wicked
insolence this one in the lying book the S.P.R. deliberately foisted on the British public.]
82
And Sinnett?
Sinnett wont invent gunpowder; but he has a beautiful style, he is splendid at editing.
And Olcott?
Olcott is not bad at editing either, when he understands what he is talking about . . . He has very often
helped me in phenomena, both over there and here. But he never can think of anything for himself.
Please let me see the magic bell.
She made a peculiar movement with her hand under her shawl, then she stretched out her arm and
somewhere in the air there sounded the tones of the Aeolian harp that had astonished everyone. She again
made a movement beneath her shawl, and in her hand . . . appeared the little piece of silver with which I
was already acquainted.
[Now what could Madame Coulomb, with her musical-box and iron-stains, say to that!]
Yes, it is the magic bell, she boasted in her thoughtlessness. A cunning little thing. That is my occult
telegraph, through which I communicate with the Master.
It is a short step now to the end. But so dramatic a scene must have a good curtain, and
so the Madame Blavatsky of this narrative is made to burn her last boats.
Save me, help me. Prepare the ground for me to work in Russia . . . . and create Koot Hoomis Russian
letters. I will give you the materials for them.
No doubt I was bound to expect something of the sort, and I did expect it. But I no longer had the
strength to sustain my part; I seized my hat, and without a word, I almost ran out into the fresh air.
[I, the present writer, feel rather like that myself! With this, as with every other attack on
Madame Blavatsky, one needs to master frequent moods of utter and furious disgust. The
brain turns away from a feeling that genius may never be safe from the conspiracy of
liars, forgers and boycotters.]
I wished to take the little thing in my hand and examine its construction. But she . . . suddenly put it into
the drawer and turned the key.
Once again, Solovyoff saves himself from a challenge. The silver bell is suddenly locked
in the drawer, so he cannot give even a description. However we learn something: the
bell was timed. First, a peculiar movement had to be made, then the arm stretched out,
and only then, came the bell sound! Suppose Madame Blavatsky had had no shawl on?
At Simla, in 1880 and at Ooty, in 1883, the bell rang scores of times when Madame
Blavatsky was at table or in evening dress; it rang in Madras when she was trying to bear
life in the scantiest of muslin wrappers; it rang here, there and everywhere, shawl or no
shawl. And then, we remember, it rang with a clear and loud sound on Solovyoffs
own table when she was in London (p.)! By the way, as a specimen of Walter Leafs
83
desperate defence of Solovyoff against Mme. J elihovskys exposure of him:
Mr. Solovyoff draws attention to the fact that this letter was written more than a year before the incident
with the little bit of silver . . . .
If it were a century before, the bell rang on Solovyoffs table, not Madame Blavatskys.
[The incident of the little bit of silver never occurred.]
XX.
[Solovyoff says that he rushed home and wrote out everything word for word. Then, in
cold blood he began to reason and decided that, after all, he had gained nothing. No! not
even a Chinese envelope.]
On the contrary, my position was worse. It is not particularly pleasant to know the truth, to have attained
it by so painful a road, and then to have to keep it to oneself, or to hear it said: But yet, my good sir, all
this is sufficiently improbable and you have no legal evidence of the possibility of what you say.
But Solovyoffs invention is now at an end. He has been unable to invent one single
scene where legal evidence would be available, and he cannot invent one; legal evidence
has to be produced, and you cannot produce pieces of silver and envelopes that never
existed. Curious that this J udas should have had pieces of silver in his fabricating mind!
Well, there he is at home . . .
Not alone! His companion with the child is there, sharing the room. All this time, all
through these days of miracles, she has been there. She may have known all about
Solovyoffs rows with Myers and the S.P.R. As a karma needing to be placated, she
must have had a say in most things. Above all, she must have made demands on his
time. The truth is that Solovyoff saw very little of Madame Blavatsky. She wrote to
Sinnett: The Solovyoffs are here . . . We see each other very little though for we both of
us have work to do. Solovyoff himself says that he had found some unexpected business
in Wurzburg (p.161.) The lady had nothing to complain of. During these first days,
Solovyoff probably never visited Madame Blavatsky except for a cup of tea and a chat
over the eternal samovar. She rose at six, worked all day and went to bed at nine oclock.
For two or three days, she lay in bed, helpless. If the declaration of Madame de
Morsier were genuine, it would only go to prove that Madame Blavatsky desired to be
bothered by Solovyoff as little as possible. One may imagine so with her article for
the Russky Vyestnik, some fanciful stories, translating something for her Theosophists
and preparing to begin her Secret Doctrine! Once again, I leave it to writers. Solovyoff
would have been wiser to leave out that trifling list, but he often writes as if
automatically, the truth. This psychological phenomenon is to be noted in every
slanderer of H.P.P.; even, and especially, in Madame Coulomb. The S.P.R. Report is full
of phrases disastrous to itself.
Solovyoff has to round off his tale, however. One would expect, from his legal doubts
that he is going to produce something at last. Not so. He is only going to make his
Madame Blavatsky talk some more and finally offer herself to him as a spy. And
84
again, with a strange providence working to destroy him, he destroys himself. He
pretends that she sent Babaji to fetch him and that he went. Presumably his lady had
noticed nothing of his excited state when he rushed home, supposed he was doing
business while writing word for word, left him in peace to think over the legal
blanks in his narrative and made no objection to his rushing out again. As she is never
once mentioned in the book, these considerations do not
hamper the author or intrigue the reader
who is kept unaware of the karmas
existence. Madame Blavatsky has
conveniently allowed him time to jot her
down, word for word, and to have a
bit of a think in cold blood, and off
Solovyoff goes again.
[Madame Blavatsky denies, as she well might, having asked him to create Russian
Mahatmic letters. She may some time have asked him to translate them for the Russian
papers. Solovyoff then makes her say a few things that she probably did say to him, but
at different moments and in a quite different fashion. She seems to have told him at some
time or other while in Switzerland about her American marriage and she probably added,
with her usual shrug Must have been some black magic about! He dishes it up now
as a confession, but, imagining that Olcott must have been a witness, he makes quite a
point of this, and so Olcott signed the register. Olcott was not present at all. Suddenly,
Solovyoffs Madame Blavatsky changed her tone.]
. . . It will not do for you to be very severe; you see, that, come what may, you have already deeply
compromised yourself by giving the London psychists an account of the masters appearance to you . .
. you wrote an account and they have printed it over your signature. So it is too late now to go back, and
your own self-love will not allow it . . . the only thing for you to do is to faire bonne mine mauvais jeu.
I have long known that sooner or later you would talk to me like this, I answered; but you must please
understand that all this does not frighten me in the least. It is clear that you know me but little. I must beg
you not to have recourse to a weapon like that.
Noble! We are not to be blackmailed, we beg you not to use such a weapon. Perhaps,
after all, it is not quite so nobly furious as one would expect, but this ignoble creature
who has not hesitated to proclaim himself falsely a daily sneak and traitor would not be
likely to know the proper dialogue for such a situation. He imagines that a man would get
on his dignity and reply as if he had merely been threatened with ostracism for spilling
ash on the carpet.
[Then, he says, she again changed tone and became gracious, made him a series of
prophecies of events to happen to him within the next two months.]
But after all it made no difference; with the poor budget I possessed I could do but little. I could
communicate nothing of real importance, no documentary evidence, that is, either to the London Society
for Psychical Research or to the Paris Theosophists. My only hope was that in the course of two months
something might turn up and my budget be enlarged.
85
[So he promises to wait two months and he writes down the prophecies. Perhaps at some
time before he left she did make some prophecies, and perhaps some of them came true,
but the events were too disagreeable in their reactions; in any case Solovyoff never says
what they were and we have only his word that they were ever made. The curtain drops
on the last scene, that is, on the last words he puts into her mouth, the offer to become a
Russian spy.]
My influence on the Hindus is enormous . . . At a sign from me, millions of Hindus would follow me, I
can easily organize a gigantic rebellion. I will guarantee that in a years time the whole of India would be
in Russian hands . . . I will bring about one of the greatest events in history . . . I proposed the same thing
some years ago when Timasheff was still minister; but I did not receive any answer. But now, now it is
much easier for me; I can arrange the whole thing in a year. Help me in such a patriotic cause.
Except for a laugh, there is only one comment necessary. H.P.B.s life, almost day by
day, in India is thoroughly well-known to students. However little she loved the English
and she had small cause to love us her whole passion, under the direction of her
Masters, was to bring about a better feeling and if possible, a brotherly feeling, between
Indians and the British Raj. Whoever denies that is simply an ignoramus or malicious.
Moreover, she and Colonel Olcott did more to reconcile English and Indians than anyone
before or after, and the opinion of the Indian Government might quite confidently be
asked on this subject. She knew that the very existence of the
Theosophical Society depended on the state of good
relations between Indians and the Government.
She landed in India in February, 1879. In J uly, the organization of the Theosophist
began. In December, she made her first visit to Sinnett. She spent part of 1880 in Ceylon
and again visited Sinnett at Simla in September. During that visit, the Government, that
had been watching her and Olcott closely, notified Olcott that they would no longer be
subjected to annoying observation.
When had she ever in her mind to organize a revolt? When could she ever have proposed
to Timasheff to bring about one of the greatest events in history and give over India into
Russian hands?
We know her whole life, we know every Indian whom she knew: and we know that
Solovyoff lies.
* * *
[What next? He goes to take leave of her.]
As I was taking leave, I said: Now Helena Petrovna, the hour of farewell has come. Listen to my honest
advice, which comes alike from the head and the heart. Have pity on yourself; throw away all this
horrible tinsel, resign from the Theosophical Society, as you yourself wished to do not long ago, nurse
your health in quiet, and write . . Let the evening of your life, at least, be bright and calm. Do not take
needless burdens on your soul; make a pause.
Too late. she said in a stifled voice; for me there is no going back. And in a moment, in quite another
tone, she went on: Know that all the masters predictions will be fulfilled, and in no more than a month
86
and a half from now.
By these last words she made it possible for me to part from her without any feeling of pity.
* * *
And he goes straight to Paris and convinces Richet.
Paris,. Oct. 8, 1885.
Dear Helena Petrovna, Which is the better, to write at random, or to hold ones tongue and work for the
good of ones correspondent? . . . I have made friends with Madame Adam, and talked a great deal to her
about you; I have greatly interested her, and she has told me that her Revue is open not only to theosophy
but to a defence of yourself personally if necessary. I praised up Madame de Morsier to her, and at the
same time there was another gentleman there who spoke on your behalf in the same tone, and Madame
Adam wished to make acquaintance with Madame de Morsier, who will remain in Paris as the official
means of communication between me and the Nouvelle Revue. Yesterday the meeting of the two ladies
took place; our Emilie was quite in raptures . . . In any case this is very good. Today I passed the morning
with Richet, and again talked a great deal about you, in connection with Myers and the Psychical Society.
I can say positively that I convinced Richet of the reality of your personal power and of the phenomena
that proceed from you. He put me three questions categorically. To the first two I answered affirmatively;
with respect to the third I said that I should be in the position to answer affirmatively, without any
trouble, in two or three months. But I do not doubt that I shall answer affirmatively, and then, you will
see! there will be such a triumph that all the psychists will be wiped out . . . Yes, so it will be; for you did
not treat me as a doll? . . . I start the day after tomorrow for St. Petersburg . . . What will happen? Your
cordially devoted Vs. Solovyoff.
* * *
Need anything more be said? We can only guess what happened. He saw himself as the
Coming Star; he was to prove to the World what it had rejected when offered by H.P.B.
under the instruction of her Master; he boasted to the Paris Theosophists and to our
Emilie and to Madame J elihovsky. The weeks went by and the Master made no sign.
Then, he began to lend an ear to Veras exhortations and especially to her disloyal gossip
about her sister, and then came the news that Hodgsons Report would put an end to
Madame Blavatskys career, once and for all. The fiend at the bottom of him awoke and
fed on his vanity and his disappointment, his dread of public ridicule: and the venom that
spurts all through this lying book began to rise and filled him.
His is only one case reported among others where the Master of H.P.B. took a look at an
aspirant and refused to make use of a foul character. The story of Madame Blavatsky
exhibits several of these ambitious traitors, all more or less psychically gifted, whose
friendship for her was based on a hope to climb not only through, but past, her. They all
sank in their own mud. They ignored the rule that no aspirant can reach a Master over the
body of a loyal chela, through whom they have once approached him, but has to come in
led by that chelas hand. In defending H.P.B., Solovyoff was not concerned with justice
but with a reward: a reward for doing the office of any man who believed in her, as he
did! He fell down on the first test, of mere patience, saw the time running away and
danger brewing, and turned savagely against her, like a mad dog, as she wrote to
Sinnett. He had it in him to turn like a mad dog, so we need not speculate on what might
have happened had he waited and stood firm. No wonder writes H.P.B. to Sinnett, No
87
wonder if after his first visit, and having had a good look at him Master would have
nothing more to do with him, all my prayers notwithstanding.
He was left to himself, his own determined path and he did his utmost to ruin her. His
greatest punishment must have been to hear of her, not ruined at all, although broken in
physical health, but achieving her magnus opus, the Secret Doctrine, surrounded by
worshipping and influential friends well able to protect her. Also when those letters were
brought to light, he must have realized that, one day or other, the name of Vs Solovyoff
would become a synonym for a rogue, for a man of so debased a character that he would
not hesitate to invent a false accusation against himself, to represent himself as a secret
daily spy, cunning, wheedling, deceiving everyone in order to make the charges
against his victim sound more probably true.
* * *
I ACCUSE THE SOCIETY FOR PSYCHICAL RESEARCH OF 1895 OF DELIBERATELY DECEIVING THE PUBLIC BY SPONSORING
AND PUBLISHING SOLOVYOFFS MODERN PRIESTESS OF ISIS WHILE IN POSSESSION OF DATED DOCUMENTS THAT
PROVED IT A FABRICATION.
I DEMAND THAT THE RECORDS OF THE SOCIETY FOR THE YEARS 1884, 1885 AND 1886 SHALL BE SUBMITTED TO
INVESTIGATION, BY A NEUTRAL COMMITTEE.
ONLY BY SUCH FRANK AND OPEN CONDUCT NOW CAN THE PRESENT S.P.R. BE RELIEVED OF THE ONUS OF ONE OF THE
MOST ATROCIOUS CONSPIRACIES OF MODERN TIMES.

In substantiation of her challenge to the Society for Psychic Research Mrs. Hastings added to her analysis
of Solovyoffs Modern Priestess of Isis the review of the book by F. Podmore, one of the leading
Researchers. Mr. Podmore swallows all of Solovyoffs statements without question. He accepts all the
assertions made, even when the discrepancies are too obvious to be overlooked. His excuses are lapse of
time affects ones memory, no notes were kept, no dates supplied, etc. Mr. Solovyoff could say nothing
wrong. Mme. Blavatsky could do nothing right. This review ties Mr. Podmore up with all the inventions
and falsehoods provided by Solovyoff as soon as he knew that Mme. Blavatsky was dead and cremated.
He felt safe then and his narrative, abridged and translated by Walter Leaf, another noted Researcher,
was hailed with rejoicing by the whole S. P. R. body, who sought, not truth, but any sort of support for
their own prejudices and adamant incredulity.
A quotation from Walter Leafs book, Some Chapters of Autobiography with a Memoir by Charlotte M.
Leaf (London: J ohn Murray, 1832) indicates his point of view and reliance on Solovyoffs falsehoods.
Mrs. Leaf, his widow, was the eldest of the four daughters of J ohn Addington Symonds. She was a very
amiable lady, and worshipped Walter who was devoted to her. The quotation is from page 155: He
has told in his autobiography how he first became interested in the question of communication from
another world; but there is no mention of the question in his diary until, in 1885, he became interested in
the claims of Mme Blavatsky. He began to read up Theosophy and to learn Russian, with which equip-
ment he began to translate her confessions in 1893 under the title of A Modern Priestess of Isis. It was
not until 1889, it seems, that he started going to meetings of the S.P.R., but from that year his attendances
were frequent and devoted mainly to experiments in hypnotism. In this year, too, he first met Mrs. Piper,
and began with that famous medium a series of seances which never really satisfied his scientific
curiosity . . . .
(Copyright. All Rights Reserved.)
No. 1
NEW UNIVERSE
Try
A Review devoted to the defence of
MADAME BLAVATSKY
6
d.
1
NEW UNIVERSE
Try
Vol. 1. No. 1. J uly, 1937. 6d.
Editor - Beatrice Hastings.
This review will be issued to support my volumes Defence of Madame Blavatsky. The volumes will be
devoted mainly to subjects that need lengthy treatment; but there is a multitude of other matters to be
considered. There are charges that may be met immediately by some recorded fact, hitherto neglected;
others for which the defence lacks data, research in different countries being necessary; others, still, may
be shown as based on the mere opinion of someone for whose opinion the modern student has little,
when any, respect. The review is intended for friendly students whether at present in or out of any
Theosophical group, and the Editor will be glad to insert signed, or initialled, well-documented
paragraphs or short articles; but nothing will be used without verification, so jokers need not lose their
sleep.
There is certainly a growing interest in Blavatsky in the outer courts, as it were. I know personally more
than one of the younger literary generation whom I have persuaded or badgered to read her works and
who have realised that the charlatan and forger holds a place in the circle of literary genius.
However, Theosophists need not expect that these persons may risk their position in the reviewing world,
until there will be a certainty of strong support by Theosophists. Neither publishers nor editors regard a
defence of Blavatsky as a paying proposition; quite the contrary, only attack pays. Wherefore, I have
been agreeably surprised to receive orders for my volumes from seven of the various, and rather
bewildering, Theosophical groups, one or two of these orders having been considerable and already
repeated. It seemed to me too soon yet for orders from far distant lands and yet, a certain vast
Christian organisation has ordered copies for a far land! I would prefer that these people, whom I cannot
stretch charity so far as to assume friendly to H.P.B., should not take up my limited stock, but I cannot
help it if they do.
My personal position being somewhat favourable to independence of publishers and reviewers, I shall
certainly continue the defence of H.P.B., for this promises an ever-deepening interest. It is not every day
that a writer discovers a writer of genius, a martyr and an occultist all in one! And when there may be
added a strain of history percolating half through the globe, a personnel that includes many famous men
and women, as well as hundreds of lesser known, and even obscure, but profoundly interesting,
characters, Europeans, Orientals, Australians, Americans, and a picturesque and fascinating environment
well, one can only throw up ones cap and thank the gods, who are not prodigal of fine subjects.
Still, of course, I have only printed a limited edition. I have used no advertisement but a leaflet, and I
have sent out no copies for review, except three by request. Being familiar with the stockish attitude of
most editors towards Blavatsky, I have no intention of wasting a single copy on them and thus presenting
some reviewer with a shilling to put in his pocket for a new book. There certainly are many reviewers
who would review if allowed to, but they are not allowed to. And until Theosophists make it clear that a
defence of Blavatsky can find a large public, No space will be the word.
Although this review starts under no auspices, I hope that it may soon enough come under the auspices
of an international H.P.B. Defence Group. My protoplasm is not immortal, and defence will be needed
2
for a considerable time; the adversary will not let go all at once. I am warned, indeed, that, for defending
this Charlatan, my own past is sure to be dragged in by her foes. Well, I have published most of it myself,
and with a youthful abandon to which I might not commit myself nowadays. But, what some Foe might
do would be to concentrate on dates. I am always pestering my family for dates, and theirs and mine
frequently disagree; I seem sometimes to have been in two places at once! However, it does not interest
me much. I grow cheerless to reflect what a silly sort of youth mine was compared with that of Helena
Petrovna. . . .
* * *
A defence group, would be quite a practical step. It would be easy as winking if Theosophists took the
lead. Every Branch might soon have a special group, each taking some personage or incident or week of
events, and collecting all the data on that head; this to be handed to a central group, and, by that body, to
some person who can not only handle documents like an historian, but can write. Chronology is the first
necessity. My own week-to-week lists show many a blank space; and yet, as I know, the case for the
defence frequently rests on a question of one day, or less. When one gets that day, one can leave defence
and swoop down in a counter-attack. Everything should come into print as soon as possible and be
available to students everywhere; very often, a decisive clue is to be found in some hardly-known letter
or article by a minor character, who thus becomes a major witness. Personally, I have gained the
conviction that the whole data will magnificently vindicate H.P.B. Even charges that depend for
disproof on esoteric data have been much simplified by the publication of the Mahatma Letters and
Letters From H.P.B. to Sinnett, where there are a thousand hints for the serious student. As for the
difficulty of getting at old records, there is not such a great difficulty; a certain number of the early prints
are still procurable, and for such as are not now to be had for money, groups can do as I did, namely,
borrow the record and have it fully typed, pasted on thick paper, and bound. A Central Group, which
would, of course, be in touch with the records everywhere, could arrange the supply. In a year or two,
every important town in the world might have a complete historical record.
Poor H.P.B. was often her worst witness. Ill, faced with howling enemies, a foreigner from a then hated
country, and she as helpless as her defenders to collect the little clues for lack of which the innocent
often go under she sometimes lost her memory and made mis-statements actually against herself, or
gave out hasty half-explanations that merely condemned her once more for lack of corroboration. Even
when the corroboration was there, it was frequently overlooked. For instance, she declared that she was
out of Cairo on the day when the mediums she had engaged for her mistaken Socit Spirite organised a
cheating sance. The S.P.R., et hoc, merely shrugged, and the Theosophists had no reply. But, Madame
Coulomb herself, in her book, Some Account of my intercourse with Madame Blavatsky, p.1., lets slip
a little mouse of a remark: I went away, leaving the crowd red as fire, ready to knock her down when
she came back.
It is with the help of a host of such mice that this review will loosen the ropes around the lioness. The
first cases I shall take concern not H.P.B., but Olcott and others. The establishment of Olcotts probity,
nowadays attacked by any pot-boiling scribbler who pleases, is as necessary as that of H.P.B., and
perhaps comes first.
I.
On May 11th, 1884, Olcott (hereinafter O.) was under examination in London by the committee
appointed by the Society for Psychical Research to take evidence as to the alleged phenomena connected
3
with the Theosophical Society. (Private and Confidential Report, Dec. 84). Messrs. Stack and Myers
examined O. Myers had asked O. to mention the circumstances of the first appearance to him of
Mahatma M. (hereinafter MM.). O. had described the scene as this may now be read in Old Diary
Leaves, Vol. 1, p.377. But he did not give a certain detail that I shall presently give for him. In his
innocence, he had exhibited the silk turban that MM. left on his table; and, to his horror, found that he
had merely raised a scarcely-concealed smile. Evidently, he grew indignant, even excited, and when
Myers said, I wish to see on what grounds you think it impossible that this was a living Hindu who left
the apartment by ordinary means, O. exclaimed: In the first place, I never saw a living Hindu before I
arrived in London on my way to India [when he and others saw MM. in Cannon Street, J an. 79. ODL.,
Vol. 2, p.5.]. I had had no correspondence with anyone until then, and had no knowledge of any living
Hindu who could have visited me in America. Thus, the shorthand notes, no doubt substantially correct.
On p. 237 of Hodgsons Report (Proceedings of the SPR. Dec. 85.), he pounces on O.: I will give
another instance of Colonel Olcotts unreliability. In replying to a question put by Mr. Myers in
connection with Colonel Olcotts account of the alleged astral form of a Mahatma which appeared to
him in New York, Colonel Olcott stated [as above]. Hodgson continues: The Theosophical Society was
founded in 1875, and long before this, Colonel Olcott had travelled with Hindus from New York to
Liverpool [1870] . . . . During the years, 1877 and 1878, he wrote many letters to one of them.
Correct; enough to hang a man and hang him innocent.
Olcott did explain, after Hodgsons preliminary attack at an SPR. meeting, May 24th, 1885, that he had
been full of his vision of the splendid Mahatma in Indian robes, and that the figures of his Hindu
fellow-passengers in common-place European costume, never came to his mind. They seem to have
stirred his sub-conscious, for he mentions correspondence; but the second Mahatmic figure, seen in
London, immediately fills the field, and he concludes that he knew no living Hindu who could have
visited him in America.
Hodgson knew all this but, in the Dec. 85. Report, he slips by Myers, who is often to be discerned
insisting on points for the defence (these Reports make quaint reading!) Hodgson clings to his prey: He
seems to have volunteered the odd remark that he had had no correspondence with anybody until then,
whereas he had written numerous letters to M.T. [Mooljie Thackersay] and other Hindus.
Well, no he had not!
Then refers to the Mahatmas visit in New York, continuing, and I had no knowledge of any living
Hindu who could have visited me in America. Now, the correspondence with MT began in 1877 (Supp.
Theosophist, J uly, 1882.). The Mahatmas visit occurred during the writing of Isis Unveiled
(ODL., Vol. I, p.377.); that is, sometime curing 1876, perhaps early, perhaps late. It may be even late
1875. I have not, so far, found exact date; perhaps it could be dug out of the Adyar archives? Isis was
handed to the publisher, Bouton, early in 1877, and by May 19th, Bouton was tearing his hair at HPB.s
alterations in the printed text.
It struck me as significant that Hodgson omitted to ask Olcott for the exact date of MM.s visit or
omitted to say hat he had done so; in either case, an omission and I have long since learned that all
Hodgson of the S.P. Research omits is the thing one should search for. Olcotts casual remark in ODL.
4
gnaws away Hodgsons knot. O. had had no correspondence with any Hindu before the Mahatmas visit.
It is gratifying to the friendly student to find HPB. and Co., expected on every occasion to exhibit
perfection and never make a mistake. However, we do not expect any such thing from mortals. In
considering statements, one has to take the ordinary care and to keep in mind that the Theosophists were
often speaking about events that had happened months, and even long years before, and to search always
for the fact itself, over and above what may be said about the fact. Olcott sometimes fails in memory and
puts carts before horses; on occasions, he exhibits a curious ignorance of the complexities of chelaship
and occult science and sacrifices HPB. to his conservative notions; he has his share, too, of the general
human shortcomings : but lying was outside his nature. His own Government was proud of him, and one
has only to examine his historical negotiations with the British Government over the 1883 riots in
Ceylon, to see that some of our statesmen and high officials had passed him in the tests they know well
how to apply to men they have to deal with.
II.
Gwala K. Deb and Babaji Dhabagiri Nath. (SPR Report,p. 246. Hodgson:)
Babaji must have joined the Bombay Theosophical Society at least as early as 1881 and remained some
time at the headquarters that year. . . The assertion made by Madame Coulomb that Mr. Babaji D. Nath is
the same person who was previously known at Bombay as Gwala K. Deb, is confirmed by testimony of
Messrs. Hume, Tatya, Pitale and Ezekiel . . . it is by no means likely that all these witnesses should
mistake another person for Mr. Babaji, for he is very small and his voice has a very peculiar timbre.
Testimony? Witnesses? There is no corroborative statement from any of the witnesses. The student,
wary of Hodgsons methods of compiling a report, is by no means likely to accept his unendorsed
word. And here we find him at one of his commonest tricks, that of presenting as if voluntary and
enthusiastic testimony what is nothing more than his own version of a reply of some sort to his leading
questions. Hume, even, gives him no written statement; Ezekiel refused a written statement on anything;
Tatya distrusted Hodgson from the first; Pitale was a signed witness to phenomena, but he signed nothing
for Hodgson. The most to be accepted is that these persons answered that Babaji resembled Deb. But, if
they had all sworn their testimony 21 witnesses swore Adolph Beck into prison, so perfectly did this
unfortunate resemble another man. No doubt, Babaji did resemble Deb, since he was chosen to double
him as chela, when sent on mission. But the data on Babaji distinguishes him from Deb.
1881", says Hodgson. From Aug. 9th, or 13th, 1881, HPB. was guest of Hume at Simla, remaining until
the very last days of October. No mention of any Deb. Then, she travelled in the Plains, arriving at
Bombay on Nov. 29th for the Convention. No mention of any Deb, and no Deb appears in the Conv.
group photos. On March 17, 82, HPB. writes to Sinnett, describing Deb in full (M.L., p.464.) as a new-
comer, wearing a Chinese Tartar cap (such as are common in parts of Tibet), and as an advanced chela of
Mahatma K.H. (hereinafter, MKH.). It was the week after the plaster cast phenomenon, when a piece
of plaster was conveyed from Bombay to Allahabad in a few minutes; and a week before the Vega
phenomenon, when letters were conveyed from a ship at sea to Bombay, and two days later, from
Bombay to Calcutta in a few minutes. So it looks as if Deb were a specialist at apports and had come
there to supply power for these two big apport phenomena.
In J une, Deb was to go with HPB. to Tibet (HPB. to APS., p.28.). The trip was vetoed by the Chohan;
and, early in August, Deb went north alone and was seen no more. At end September, Babaji Dhabagiri
5
Nath, his living picture, appeared at Darjeeling. Where could he have come from?
Countess Wachtmeister had many talks with Babaji at Wrzburg, in Dec. 85. (Reminiscences of H.P.
Blavatsky., p.24.). He told her that he first came to HPB. at Adyar, in a state of terror and collapse,
having escaped from a Tamil guru who had put him through Hatha Yoga, for which he was quite
unfitted. The enemy laughs at this story, because Babaji came from Darjeeling to Bombay in Nov. 82,
and the Adyar house was not occupied until December. Looks bad! But, Babaji was a Madras Presidency
man, and his guru a man of the Giri sect; and, from April 23rd to May 3rd, 1882, HPB. was in Madras,
and from May 3rd to 30th, was travelling by canal in the wilder parts of the Presidency, and from May
30th to J une 6th, was frequently at Adyar, looking over the property then offered for sale.
It is credible that Babaji was led to her in this region; it is hardly credible that, in March, 1882 (first
appearance of Deb), when even Madras city had scarcely heard of the TS. let alone Hodgsons 1881!
Babaji found his way through the jungles and across the continent to Bombay headquarters, wearing a
Chinese-Tartar cap. Deb was at Bombay until August; and it looks as if Babaji, after meeting HPB.
somewhere in his native Presidency, had been sent straight to Tibet or Sikkim and there had been trained
for double-chelaship. (People who dont like this need only to write to the Order, as Hume did,
advising the Chiefs to change their methods.) I think it is clear that HPB. never knew everything about
Babaji, and it would be against the rules if she had known. Babaji kept his old sunyasi name of Dhabagiri
Nath, and HPB., although she occasionally dubbed him Deb, usually in inverted commas, was obliged
to use no other name but Dhabagiri Nath when speaking of the Tibetan chela he represented. Hence her
hopeless explanations and the bewildered tears of Sinnett (HPB. to APS., many pages).
Babaji played an important part, if he did not over-play it, in weakening European curiosity about the
Adepts; as did Mohini, another sacrifice to the mysteries. HPB. was never quite docile about this
necessity. Having introduced the Mahatmas (but have we ever had their real names, let alone their
addresses highly improbable?), she could not endure to hear them doubted. If she had lived to see
General Macdonalds inquisitive cannon smashing through the Toechen monastery in 1904. . . ! There
must have gone up very early in her Indian career a protest from ascetic Orders the length from Comorin
to Lhasa against her indiscretions. We hear something of it from the chela, R. Gargya Deva, who roundly
rates HPB. in an Open Letter in the Theosophist, Dec. 83. Her joyous despatch of Babaji to Sinnett
at Simla to prove the existence of the Adepts, was just what was to give later a big blow to Western
belief in the Occult Orders. After a few preliminary blunders, the little man played his part almost
terribly well in Europe. I will trace it one day. Now, it will take a century to restore any belief of the
kind, and before that, India, with the northern states, will either be reconciled and left more to its own
mystical ideas of progress or lost. I hope it will not be lost.
British rulers may he asses, but there are snakes and hyenas waiting. The missionaries and the SPR. did
us a rotten turn by attacking the conciliatory TS. of the eighties.
III
The black on Hodgson (Sinnett) was not sufficient for the SPR. In 1894, the Council sponsored
Solovyoffs book, A Modern Priestess of Isis, translated by Walter Leaf. I hope to publish a review of
this. S. had an expert pen, of a sort, and made a book that Professor Sidgwick and lady the latter
dutifully sharing her husbands hobby, or mania, of hounding psychic persons might well find
entertaining, especially as coming from the pen of a member of their Society. But, there can be few
books with a more unenviable claim to be signed Scoundrel. Knowing the data, I could detect a
6
falsification every few pages. Like Mme. Coulomb, S. often cunningly works up something charged
against HPB., or even some mere insinuation, into a little drama.
Many readers must have been impressed by page 165 of his book, where he makes HPB. jeer at the
worthy signatories to her phenomena. Thereon, he makes her declaim: How often has it happened that,
under my directions, minutes of various phenomena have been drawn up; lo, the most conscientious
people . . . have signed at the foot of the minutes! The reader wonders how S. could have invented such
a thing as that. Well, as in other cases, he had not even the trifling agony of invention. In his members
copy of the 1st Report, he had read: Many worthy persons would be willing to sign a statement that a
gas-burner gave a good light, when in point of fact, they could scarcely see their hands before them.
I refer now to the famous Confession written in Russian by HPB. to Solovyoff, and translated by Leaf
on page 176 of M.P. of I. S. used this letter to break up the Paris TS. in Feb. 86. He translated the
letter into French, had it scaled by J ules Baissac, Sworn Interpreter to the Court of Appeal, Paris, and
brought what he alleged to be this same document to Mme. de Morsier, Sec. of the TS., whom he had
long been preparing against HPB. To the consternation of Mme. de M. and her cterie, HPB. was
found declaring that she had invented the Mahatmas. There was the sealed French translation! But, here
is the passage, as rendered by Leaf in English:
If I am lost, I am lost with everyone. I will even take to lies, to the greatest of lies, which for that reason
is the most likely to be believed. I will say and publish it in the Times and all the papers, that the master
and Mahatma K.H. are only the product of my imagination.
There is no statement that they are imaginary. She says that she will say so as the greatest of lies. What
made the Morsier cterie, believe that she had categorically denied the Masters? There is no data to show
whether anyone outside cterie, that immediately broke away, ever saw the French document. S. left it in
confidence with Mme. de M. and returned to Russia. The news of the Paris dbcle travelled to St.
Petersburg and reached Mme. J elihovsky, HPB.s sister, who was then, early 1886, out with HPB. and
in with Solovyoff. He showed her the Russian letter. She writes (P.318, M.P. of I.; Leafs synopsis of
a controversy between Mme. J . and S.): I at once expressed my perplexity; there was in the letter no
admission that the Mahatmas were an invention. How then had the Parisians come to believe it? Mr.
Solovyoff himself answered that he did not know how. He also said that he could not show her the
French translation; it was in Paris. Apparently he had no copy!
Leafs translation from the Russian shows why S. had a good reason to have no copy to show a lady who
knew both Russian and French. For, by one of the chances that accompany HPB., we have one
sentence from the French.
In 1891, after HPB.s death, Mme. J . went on the warpath for her sisters memory. She went to Paris to
demand a view of the French document. But Solovyoff had got in first, had written to Mme. de M. and
got back his translation. However, in the course of attack, Mme. J . forced him to cite one single sentence
and this sentence does not agree with Leafs version. Solovyoff had translated the sentence: I will
even take to lies, to the greatest of lies, which for that reason is the most likely to be believed by J e
vais mentir, horriblement mentir, et on me croira facilement. English I mean to lie, lie horribly, and
people will easily believe me.
It is absolutely incredible that Baissac passed that. The Sworn Interpreter at the Paris Court of Appeal
would know his Russian as well as Mr. Leaf.
7
At the time of the break-up, there was a belief among certain of the Theosophists that Solovyoff, during
an absence of Baissac from his office a piece of information Louis Dramard had obtained had
tampered with the official seal, had either stamped a blank sheet on which he afterwards wrote, or had
stamped a falsified copy he had brought. Mme. J . accused him of this to Brusiloff; and Solovyoff did not
prosecute her. In a letter that S. solicited from Baissac, the latter declares that he himself stamped the
document, but does not contradict the statement that he had left S. alone in the office. It was supposed
also, that S. had so re-arranged the spacial position of the sentences as to make them read as if HPB.
meant to lie horribly against everyone and make them all lost along with herself; the reference to the
Masters beginning on a new line as a new subject and so appearing to be a categorical denial.
In my future study of all this affair, I will show how Leaf wriggled. What may be asked now is:
1. Why the SPR. did not request S. to produce the French translation?
2. Why Leaf did not publish, even in Latin letters, or by photography, the Russian text of the disputed
passage?
3. Why he allowed the discrepancy between his English and the French sentence wrung from Solovyoff
to go unnoticed?
As Leaf interfered in the controversy between Mme. J . and S. and went so far as to write a footnote
(P.319.) that is a sample of literary cunning, it is to be hoped that some member of the SPR. may press
for an inquiry. The SPR. fought the TS. through the person of H. P. Blavatsky and, as the modern student
sees, won by a succession of fouls. The SPR. can never clear itself, but students determined to have the
truth may yet persuade it to pronounce the Mea culpa!
IV.
Damodars astral flights. Nov. 83, from United Provinces to Adyar.
The first flight was a surprise to everyone. He carried to Adyar a post-stamped letter received by Olcott
at Cawnpore, Nov. 4. To Adyar, 5 days post. The letter (ODL. vol. 3, pp. 27, 30. Also, HPB. to
APS. p.68: Damodar has so developed that he can get out of his body at will.) was reposted from
Adyar on Nov. 5, and stamped at Alighar, Nov. 10th. Immediately after this, General and Mrs. Morgan,
Theosophists at Ootacamund, were summoned to Adyar by a Mahatmic letter; they were there by Nov.
10th. On the 10th, Damodar made his second astral flight. Olcott had been ordered by MM. to stop
healing, as his vitality had been getting low for months past. D. went in astral from Moradabad to Adyar
to ask HPB. who was MM.s chela, to ask MM. for an exception in favour of two paralysed boys.
D. brought message, confirmed by wire from Alyar: Henry can try the parties once. Hodgson (SPR
Report, p. 233.): The word parties seems to me a suspicious circumstance . . . The word boys would
be shorter and more natural. Maybe. But in the notice that O. was to stop, dated Oct. 19th, and published
in Theosophist, Nov. 83., the word parties is used instead of patients. All part of the plot, no
doubt!
The Morgans remained at Adyar. On Nov. 17th, D. made his third flight, gate-crashed in on HPB., made
Mme. Coulomb scream and let go a chair she was holding, and HPB. fell and hurt her knee. That night,
8
came a wire from Olcott, asking her to confirm Ds report of an accident. But HPB. was legless and
cross and had gone to bed, so put off reply until next day. Besides, the marvel of Ds flights had worn
off; in a letter to Sinnett, Nov. 26th, she does not even mention the affair. Next day, she wired,
confirming news of accident and also, D.s report that the Morgans were at Adyar. When O. described
this incident to the SPR. Committee, in May, 1884, HPB. wrote on his deposition:
They had just arrived from Nilgherry Hills. Hodgson later learned, what nobody had any reason to
conceal, the Morgan's arrival being published in Theosophist, namely, that Morgans had been there a
week. HPB. a liar, of course!
Not a bit of it. Ds third flight had been pigeon-holed by her among the thousand and one other
phenomena. The first had bowled her over, the second was impressed by the Mahatmas summons of
Morgans to Adyar and on this occasion, they had just arrived from Nilgherry Hills.
HPB. merely mixed two dates, six months after. The pages of Hodgsons Report dealing with astrals
would afford Theosophists some amusement. But, to think that innocent Olcott actually lent his Diary to
assist this sleuth!
V.
SPR Report, p.301. Hodgson: Madame Coulomb asserts that the earliest specimens of the M. writing
were written by Babula.
As Babula, HPBs servant, a natural linguist, but unable to write English, was also unable even to read it,
his testimony to the Adyar Committee (Report, p.133.) had to be written for him by V. C. Iyer, Pleader at
Madura, read to Babula, and witnessed. We, the undersigned, declare that the above paper was carefully
read and explained to the signer in our presence, etc. Signed by 4 witnesses. Madame Coulomb asserts
. . .!
VI.
In Sinnetts pitiable Early Days of Theosophy in Europe, p.46, he writes: We were all so much
impressed by this paper [later called Light on the Path] that we felt it was not one to be kept merely for
our private edification.
I happen to possess a copy of the rare 1st edition, and on the flyleaf is a note in pencil, signed F.H.B.:
Redway [the publisher] told me that Sinnett called today and told him that this little book was too good
for the public and ought to have been reserved for the Inner Circle of Theosophists. 7th October, 1885.
There is a state known to mountaineers as altitude deterioration: You have come too high for your
stamina, and you begin to lose sight of your object, and presently you dont even care to get down lower;
but if you dont get down, you go all to pieces. Sinnett resembles this type of sufferer. In Early Days,
on many pages, he seems willing to throw down even the Masters as so much baggage encumbering his
ease, keeping only the phantoms of his conjecture . . . that all flatter Sinnett as a high-region climber,
while he is obviously slowly suffocating. He had found bewildering inconsistencies and faults in H.P.B.,
and he threw her away. He might as well have thrown away tubes of oxygen because the outside was
spotted.
9
VII.
A quotation. To your first question theres little to answer: Can you do anything to help on the
Society? Want me to speak frankly? Well, I say No: neither yourself nor the Lord Sang-yias Himself
so long as the equivocal position of the Founders is not perfectly and undeniably proved due to fiendish
malice and systematic intrigue could help it on.

Mahatma M. to Sinnett, Nov. 1881. (Mahatma Letters,P.254.)

I have to thank the Blavatsky Association for loan of SPR. P. and C. Report; also, Mr. J ohn Watkins for
loan of Adyar 1885 Report; also, Mr. A. T. Barker for loan of Theosophist, 1879; also, Mr. R. Morris
for Theosophist, 1882-3, and other books. Will someone please lend me W. T. Browns Life, and
Peebles Around the World Could anyone get me a full copy of Ruthnovelus article on Adyar
phenomena, in Philosophic Inquirer, April 8th, 1883?
Will anyone in America make extracts from Occult Word? Can anyone state or supply data to show
whether there were a shelf inside the Shrine? Hodgson frequented Coulomb, who designed the Shrine,
for three months and omitted to get either a full description or a design. Inference : something in favour
of the defence.
New Universe may be obtained from Mrs. Hastings, 4 Bedford Row, Worthing, Sussex. Review copies
sent only by request. Usual Trade terms on orders of twelve or more. Price will remain the same even if
circulation permits of enlargements.
Cheques and orders payable to Beatrice Hastings.
DEFENCE OF MADAME BLAVATSKY Vol. 1. 2/6d.
Vol. II. will not be issued until end of September. Subscribers are notified that the section, Coulomb
Pamphlet, has had to be greatly lengthened, and will take up the whole of Vol. II. The other sections
previously advertised will appear in Vol. III. New Universe is the same size as the volumes, and is
stitched for binding.
1
NEW UNIVERSE
Try
Vol. 1. No. 2. December, 1937. 6d.
Editor - Beatrice Hastings.
New Universe is not intended to deal with teachings or philosophy. It is intended as a double line of
activity in the practical defence of Madame Blavatsky, to bring out facts in her defence. Facts alone will
avail against the false allegations spread once with astounding malice all over the world, and circulated
anew every few years for the delusion of people and especially of every new generation of reviewers of
books. Where the indirect evidence is so strong as to convince me that the link fact must be somewhere
in the records, I do not hesitate to express an opinion, but the fact alone can decide. We want the truth.
Anyone who may bring me instances of errors in my data will find the correction printed with grateful
thanks, if no undue humility seeing that I am holding in memory thousands of dates, names of persons
and places, statements true, false and parti-coloured in short, the contents of about a hundred books
for and against, about and by H.P.B. and Company, as well as the files of the Theosophist, Lucifer,
Path and other publications. (Dont imagine any martyrdom! The greatest pleasure.)
Several good defences have been begun, but have failed for want of following up and support. New
Universe was started to avoid any such mishap in my case. Numbers will be issued between the
volumes, Defence of Madame Blavatsky, of which I now reckon there will be seven; but more may be
needed. The volumes all published, New U. will become a monthly journal, and I am as sure as one
may be of anything that support will not be lacking. Years and years hence, students will still be
discovering new data in favour of H.P.B. She was not a charlatan, she was not a fraud. She was a woman
of superb genius, she was an occultist. Therefore, the upshot of all the researches can only glorify and
vindicate her. This is my conclusion, and on this I work.
Lucky young Theosophist brought up on Blavatsky! The most brilliant day for her is to come. Too
brilliant, some may find it. Their trial will be to see her figuring in plays, novels, films and no doubt a
model of the famous Hole in the Wall will tempt Madame Tussaud, with life-size Coulombs conspiring
close by. In the meantime, Theosophists would be wise to get control of the coming movement and try to
guide it in the right direction; fill their magazines from their archives, reprint faithfully the early books
and make typed copies of all Reports and articles; in short, collect libraries of all the literature for and
against H.P.B., and thus be in command of the position. For one of these days not too far ahead, the
world will claim Blavatsky: in her vast and varied writings is something for everyone.
The self-styled Theosophist, then, who will not know what he ought to know will be ridiculous and, in
morality, shown up as far below any ignorant Baconian, Browningite or any follower of anyone from
whom he professed to have profited intellectually or morally. I meet today people who talk about being
on the Path, shown them by H.P.B., and who do not defend the reputation of their teacher. If I found
myself on any path with such individuals, I should jump down the precipice as the likelier road to
salvation. Mahatma K.H. wrote once of a certain kind of folk: They are of the Universal Brotherhood
but in name, and gravitate at best towards Quietism that utter paralysis of the Soul. They are intensely
selfish in their aspirations and will get but the reward of their selfishness. (Mahatma Letters, p.210.)
2
Whom the cap fits . . .
But there are real aspirants who have a differently dangerous outlook. These imagine that the present
Defence is going to have a walk-over. They are wrong. Fifty years calumny is not going to be wiped out
at once. Besides, big Interests are concerned. These will work secretly; and as I am convinced now, the
Attack is systematic and periodical, the key position being behind the infamous S.P.R. Report. That
Report must be publicly withdrawn. The present average S.P.R. member probably knows little but the
name of Blavatsky as a charlatan. When these members begin to know the facts, there will be a buzz in
the S.P.R. Students! make it your business to make the S.P.R. members all over the world aware of my
Defence until someone even better equipped comes out with a better one. Defend Blavatsky, write
about Blavatsky, lecture on Blavatsky, talk about Blavatsky at every good opportunity. She is now an
Outlaw, thanks to the S.P.R. Anyone may safely say what he pleases against her. The world will finally
correct this, but the friends of Blavatsky should be able to claim the honour and reward. Blavatsky is
a source of more than one kind of energy.
No fear of falling into blind worship, either. She, herself, has taken precautions against hysteria in the
devotee; and, on this point, her Master has taken the further precaution of dotting is and crossing ts. No
goddess at all but a great soul.
A great soul and a great genius. Neither Emile Zola in defending Dreyfus nor Voltaire in defending J ean
Calas had such a personage to defend, and yet, look how these two men of genius set about it! J ean
Calas, a Protestant, of no interest as such to Voltaire, was already tortured and executed. The J esuits
fancied him safely, silently dead and done with. But Voltaire threw up all his own work to vindicate
Calas. Why? Because the defence of Calas represented the defence of the universal ideal of justice and
liberty. Dreyfus was tightly shut up on Devils Island, had no friends, was a J ew and poor. Yet, Zola
risked position, fortune and reputation and went into exile to defend him. In both cases, atrocious
conspiracy in high quarters was unmasked, and the victim vindicated. And as much may be done for H.
P. Blavatsky and Company. Get Defence Groups together, people of intelligence and clear wits, loyal and
resolute, who will tabulate, master the facts and spread them abroad, and never let go until the most
influential of enemies will not venture to call her a charlatan, under penalty of public indignation.
I continue in this number the defence of H.P.B. and others, taking it for granted that students know what I
have written previously. In future, plain figures will be used for numbering cases.
8.
Hodgsons mishandlings of Olcotts evidence.
On May 11th, 1884, O. testified to the SPR Committee concerning Damodars astral flight from
Moradabad to Adyar. (First, or Pri. and Con. Report, p.40. Refer also, New U., No. 1, Case 4 (IV).
O. At the headquarters (Adyar) resides M. Alexis Coulomb, Librarian of the Society. He was, at the time
of Damodars alleged visit, engaged at some work adjoining the writing bureau where Madame Blavatsky
was. Suddenly he came into the room and asked Madame Blavatsky where Mr. Damodar was as he had
heard his voice in conversation with her.
Myers. From whom did you hear this?
3
O. From M. Coulomb himself.
~ ~ ~
On page 235 of Hodgsons Report, H. comments: I may notice here that M. Coulomb has stated to me
that he told Colonel Olcott a falsehood at the request of Madame Blavatsky; and I may recall the fact,
that we felt bound to mention in our First Report (p.40, note), that when Colonel Olcott quoted to us M.
Coulombs testimony as that of a trustworthy witness, he was aware that M. Coulomb had been charged
with making trap-doors and other apparatus for trick manifestations. Further, when Colonel Olcott
received the proof-sheets of his deposition, he must have been aware that the Coulombs had been
expelled from the Theosophical Society.
This is a characteristic small sample of the SPR Report. With the dates under his hand, Hartmanns
pamphlet, p.41, and Mme. Coulombs pamphlet, P.3, in both of which it is shown that Coulomb only
confessed about the trap-doors on May 16th, Hodgson attacks Olcott for quoting Coulomb on May 11th.
On May 11th, C. had not been charged with making trap-doors. There was then no evidence against him
at all. On May 15th, he was politely requested to resign, simply because his wife had been expelled on
that day for attempted extortion of money and malice. (Coulomb pamphlet, p.107.) On May 11th, Olcott
was still in full belief that Mr. C. was the good honourable husband of his wife, and himself one of the
victims of her stupid stories. (See Vol. 2 Defence of Madame Blavatsky, p.96, for O.s letter to Mme.
C.)
Hodgson talks about proof-sheets. O. certainly never saw the printed proof-sheets of the First Report.
H. can only mean the shorthand notes of the deposition, done into longhand. And he omits to give any
date. From which I conclude that the date would not serve his turn, and was probably only a day or two
after May 11th. HPBs notes on the depositions show that she received in Paris all sheets within a few
days. Stretch the date to the 17th, when Hartmann cabled O. for authority to expel both the Cs: stretch it
to the end of the month, even Olcott had no details condemning Mr. C. until the middle of J une, when
letters, posted after the examination of the trapdoors on May 17th, reached Europe. Olcott was decidedly
not required to withdraw Cs testimony, published six months earlier in Theosophist, Dec. 83, or to
supply the SPR with an account of what was then regarded as simply a domestic trouble in the TS. As for
denouncing Coulomb, so recently a member of the TS, the Colonel, at that time of shock and doubt,
would have thought twice about it. Queer people, these psychists!
~ ~ ~
Mr. Coulomb has stated to me that he told a falsehood at the request of Madame Blavatsky, says
Hodgson. So this must be true. Or, if not true, quite true, compared with the falsehood C. told to Olcott.
When O. quotes Mr. C., he is charged with quoting a man whose word could at no time be accepted, not
six months before, not on the spot, not any time. And yet, Coulomb will do for the SPR! Mr. Coulomb
has stated to me . . . and Madame Blavatsky stands condemned on his bare word!
My lord, the witness, Colonel Olcott has misleadingly quoted the testimony of an untrustworthy person
as though this person were trustworthy, but this person has stated to me . . .
No wonder the Indian lawyers smiled at Hodgsons Report and stuck to Olcott!
4
9.
The Moradabad Case.
During the whole of the years 1882-3, Olcott had been engaged in magnetic healing. His cures were so
many and so marvellous that at last he had half India flocking after him for treatment. One morning, so
he tells us in Old Diary Leaves, Vol.3, p.22, I found my left forefinger devoid of sensation a clear
warning to be careful; and between Madras and Bombay [Sep.83], it had taken me much longer and
demanded far greater exertions to effect cures than it had previously: there was a much larger percentage
of failures. This is not to be wondered at, for after treating one way or another some 8,000 patients within
the twelve-month, the sturdiest psychopath, let alone a man of fifty-odd, might be expected to have come
to the last volt in his vital battery: a state to which the tiring journeys, the nights of broken sleep, the
often meagre food, and the ceaseless intellectual strain of a large correspondence, daily converzaiones,
and almost daily extemporaneous lectures on profound themes must, naturally, have greatly helped to
bring about.
On Oct. 19th, O. received an order from his Master to cease treatments.
He was just off on a tour of the north of India. The programme had already been printed for the
Supplement to the Theosophist, Nov. 83, and the following notice had accompanied it: The President-
Founder extremely regrets that the enormous growth of the Society and the heavy work that it entails on
him prevents his giving more than a day and a half to each place instead of at least three, as he was very
anxious to do. He therefore hopes that the Branches will utilise every available moment . . . so that all the
work may be got through in one day. The next morning may be devoted to the treating of patients by
Mesmerism. Even with all this shortness of visits, he fears very much that he may not reach the
Headquarters in time to prepare for the celebration of the Societys Eighth Anniversary . . .
This programme will be as strictly adhered to as possible. Any change necessitated by unforeseen
contingencies, will be signified by telegram. Bombay, 17th. October.
In 1881, the Anniversary had had to be postponed for several weeks, as Olcott could not leave Ceylon.
After the above was in press, came the order from the Mahatma, and HPB, editing at Adyar, was
apparently obliged to cut out front page matter and insert the order:
President-Founders Circular. Since the printed programme of his tour was despatched [to Branches] on
the 18th, the President-Founder has received peremptory ORDERS from his SUPERIORS not to take a
single case for treatment until further advised. For fear, therefore, that this prohibition may not be
removed before his reaching your Station, the President-Founder requests you to notify the fact of the
ORDER to parties who have been promised or may be expecting his help.
~ ~ ~
This Order, couched in such language, was so implicitly respected by the Indian public that Olcott had no
trouble the whole way until he reached the town of Moradabad, where the Moradabad case came into
being.
From Theosophist, Dec. 83: We have much pleasure to be able to lay before the public a remarkable
psychological phenomenon, as interesting as it is well-authenticated. On Nov. 10th, a European
5
gentleman [Coulomb] attached to the Theosophical Headquarters was engaged in some work in a room
adjoining that of Madame Blavatsky, when he heard a voice which he believed was that of Mr. D.K.M.
[Damodar K. Mavalankar], an officer of the Parent Society, speaking to Madame Blavatsky in her room.
As this young man had, to that gentlemans knowledge, left the Headquarters some weeks previously to
join Colonel Olcott at Poona, he naturally thought at the time that he had come back, and so entered
Madame Blavatskys room to greet the officer in question on his return. But fancy his surprise when, on
entering the room, he found that D.K.M. was nowhere to be seen; and his surprise positively grew to
amazement when, on enquiring, he found that, though this young Brahmin was at the moment at
Moradabad, N.W.P., yet Madame Blavatsky, who was then standing looking very much perplexed before
the shrine, setting it in order, had also not only heard that chelas voice, but assured the gentleman that
she had a message from D.K.M. that was of great importance, the words of which she was asked to repeat
by telegram. She immediately proceeded to have them wired to Moradabad, and the message was sent. In
the evening, General and Mrs. Morgan from Ooty, Miss Flynn from Bombay, Mr. Mohini M. Chatterji
from Calcutta and others on a visit to Adyar, talked the matter over a great deal, all expressing surprise
and intense curiosity as to how far the phenomenon would be verified.
With these prefatory remarks, we may safely leave the following documents to speak for themselves . . .
These documents were received at Adyar five days later:
On the evening of November 10th, Mr. D.K.M., having at the request of Mr. Shankar Singh of
Moradabad promised to ask the Mahatmas whether Col. Olcott would be permitted to treat mesmerically
two children, in whom Shankar Singh was interested, and having at his request gone to Adyar
Headquarters in the Sukshma sarira (astral body), told us that he had received a message at the Adyar
Shrine; at the same time he also said that he had asked Madame Blavatsky to give Col. Olcott a
confirmation of his visit as well as of the order received through the shrine from Col. Olcotts guru by
sending a telegram to him, D.K.M. or to Shankar Singh; after which he reported (4.50 p.m.) its substance
in these words: Henry can try the parties once, leaving strongly mesmerised. Cajaputti oil to rub in three
times daily to relieve sufferers. Karma cannot be interfered with.
[Signed by Shankar Singh and eleven other witnesses.]
The telegram mentioned by D.K.M. has just been received (8.45 a.m., Nov. 11th) as a deferred or night
message of 34 words, in which the above exact words are repeated. Madame Blavatsky says a voice
from shrine spoke the words, and adds that D.K.M. heard the voice, and the telegram is sent at his
request.
Copy of the telegram received from Madame Blavatsky by Mr. D.K.M.
(Class D)
To Moradabad From Adyar (Madras)
Words Days Hours Minutes
49 10 [Nov.] 17 [5 p.m.] 15
To Damodar K. Mavalankar From H.P. Blavatsky.
c/o Colonel Olcott.
Voice from Shrine says Henry can try parties once, leaving strongly mesmerised. Cajaputti oil, rub three
times daily to relieve suffering. Karma cannot be interfered with. D. heard voice; telegram sent at his
request.
6
Noted that the telegram is dated Adyar, 5.15 p.m., or but 25 minutes later than the time when Ds
psychic message was reported at Moradabad. The two places are 2,281 miles apart. [Signed by 8
witnesses.]
~ ~ ~
O. gave further details to the SPR Committee on May 11th, 1884 (First Report, p.36): I was strongly
importuned by a gentleman named Shankar Singh, a Govt. official and not then a Theosophist, to
undertake the cure of two lads aged 12 and 14 respectively, who had each on arriving at the age of ten
years become paralysed . . . I refused in this instance, having already within the previous year done too
much of it for my health. The gentleman urged me again. I again refused. He spent perhaps 10 or 15
minutes in trying to persuade me . . . but as I still refused, he went to Mr. Damodar, who was travelling
with me in his official capacity. Shankar Singh represented the case, and appealed to Mr. Damodars
sympathies, and at last persuaded him to go in double, or phantasm, to the headquarters of our Society at
Madras, and try to enlist the goodwill of Madame Blavatsky.
Myers. Was it known at headquarters that you were at Moradabad on that day?
O. It was not known . . . for while on a tour, I was constantly obliged to interrupt the previously settled
programme, and go hither and thither to found new branches. All the elements are against any
procurement. To understand the present case, you must know that it is the rule in those Eastern schools of
mystical research that the pupils are not permitted to seek intercourse with Teachers other than their own.
[But they are allowed to apply through the chelas of other Masters, the Master deciding whether or no to
notice the communication]. Hence Damodar, who is the pupil the Sanskrit word is chela of
Mahatma Koot Hoomi, could not himself approach my own Teacher, who is another person. Madame
Blavatsky and I are pupils of the same Master, and hence she was at liberty to communicate with him on
this subject. [By the rules, O. himself could not question MMs order to him to stop healing, published in
Tt, Nov. 83.] Mr. Damodar, preparatory to taking his flight, then sent Mr. Shankar Singh out of the
room and closed the door. A few minutes later he returned to his visitor, who was waiting just outside in
the verandah. They came in together to the part of the house where I was sitting . . . Mr. Damodar said
that he had been in the double to headquarters, and had talked with Madame Blavatsky, who had refused
to interfere. But while they were conversing, both heard a voice, which they recognised as that of my
Teacher . . . Mr. Damodar remarked that . . . he would dictate from memory the message.
O. [after showing the documents above]: According to the best of my recollection, it must have been a
quarter past four when Shankar Singh first appealed to me to heal the boys, that being 35 minutes before
the actual date of the memorandum. The memo. states that Damodar added, after repeating the message
he had received from headquarters, that he had asked Mme. Blavatsky to confirm the thing to me by
sending a telegram repeating the message or its substance, either to him or Mr. Shankar Singh. The next
morning the expected telegram arrived. [Dated by P.O. Adyar, 5.15 p.m. the previous day, that is, 25
minutes after date of Damodars 4.50 p.m. memorandum at Moradabad. P.O., Colonel explained, is three
quarters of a mile from headquarters, man going there on foot after Mme. B. had written telegram, given
him money and directions; then message had to be received, registered and get its date, 5.15 p.m.]
Stack: It was practically an immediate reply? O.: Yes.
Colonel then gave the information about Coulomb (see No.8, above). Myers asked if they might apply to
the telegraph people for confirmation of wire. To this and other questions of the sort, HPB replied
7
affirmatively from Paris; and the Report states, p.80; Madame Blavatsky and Colonel Olcott have
repeatedly offered to assist us in India to examine all telegrams sent by or to any members of their group
during the existence of the Theosophical Society. And, no doubt, Hodgson did so., with no good results
for himself, as his Report omits all this. The SPR suppressed this First Report so far as they could and, as
I know from a personal letter from one of their then members, the people in the office positively denied
that any such Report had ever existed! My distinguished and well-known correspondent had lost his copy
and had applied for another. I myself have been so fortunate as to obtain recently a copy, and I have
several typed copies, made last spring, to lend to Defence groups.
Stack and Myers then questioned O. as to whether D. could have gone out and wired to HPB. O. replied
in the negative. O. replied to query that D. had never met Mr. Singh before, complicity between them
impossible; also that the gentleman held the rank of Thakur and that Damodar was an honourable person;
then O. continued.
O. I will state circumstances that will show the little probability there was of any such conspiracy.
Notice had been put into the Theosophist some months before that I was going to make such and such
official tours throughout India, and that persons who had sick friends, might, within certain hours on the
second day of my visit to each station, bring them to me to be healed. Shankar Singh had written to me
long before my coming to Moradabad, asking me to undertake the cure of these boys, and offering to
bring them to Madras to me. I refused to see anybody there, but told him he could bring the boys to me
when I came to Moradabad, in the course of my tour; and it was in pursuance of that authorisation that he
came and importuned me so. He said, Here is something that you are, in a way, pledged to undertake,
and that is what made him so urgent. [Finis.]
~ ~ ~
Now let us have a look at the Plot.
Shankar Singh has a promise from Olcott to try and heal his boys. In the meantime, Olcotts strength has
sunk so low that one of his fingers goes dead. On October 19th, Olcott receives an order in the
following terms, to stop healing: not to take a single case for treatment until further advised. This order
is printed in Theosophist for November and Branch Secretaries are desired to circulate the notification
to parties who have been promised or who may be expecting his help. Throughout the tour, Colonel has
no trouble with importunate people, but at Moradabad, awaits Shankar Singh whose persistent faith is to
rival that of the woman in the Bible.
Now, Madame Blavatsky and Damodar, neither of whom have ever met the gentleman, have foreseen this
faith on the part of Shankar Singh. It was on this foresight of Shankar Singhs faith that they have based
their Plot. Their penetration has gone even further, for they have foreseen that nothing would prevent
Olcott from being at Moradabad on scheduled time, namely Nov. 10th, although it was the commonest
thing for the tour schedules to be altered on the route (Old Diary Leaves, many pages). Their
prescience does not stop even here, for they have foreseen that Shankar Singh would come to the Colonel
before 4.50 and not after 5.15 at the extreme latest, in fact a good fifteen minutes must be allowed off
this. They have left nothing unforeseen: not the certainty of there being no railway breakdown or other
accident anywhere en route; no sudden indisposition of Olcott or of Singh himself or one of his relatives;
no sudden important visitor to detain either of them, no call of either anywhere by anyone; no sudden
dust-storm, or thunderstorm, or any other Act of God. Providence, Transport, Olcott, Singh and all
behave exactly as Madame Blavatsky and Damodar have foreseen. Rather lucky, because they have left
8
themselves a narrow fifteen minutes to play with! And they are 2,281 miles apart. And then, we have not
finished! They have foreseen that nothing would happen at the Adyar end of the line, that neither rain,
fire, wind, disease nor man would put any impediment to jeopardise the success of the Plot within the
available fifteen minutes. Wonderful, for nothing went wrong!
And the Plot, based on the aforesaid foresight, was this: that, at Moradabad, on Nov. 10th, near 5 p.m.,
Damodar should pretend to fall into a trance and to take an astral flight to Adyar and bring back a certain
message, and that at Adyar, 2,281 miles away, on Nov. 10th, near 5 p.m., Madame Blavatsky should
despatch a telegram saying that Damodar had been to Adyar and had asked her to repeat the message and
confirm his presence.
Intelligence reels under the audacity of Madame Blavatsky if there really had been a plot. Where is there
anything comparable? But, calming down, we are forced to murmur But how could she know for
certain that Shankar Singh would come at all, let alone just in the absolute nick of time?
~ ~ ~
And so, the SPR was driven to enquire whether there might not have been conspiracy between Damodar
and the Thakur Saheb, a Govt. official, and not even a Theosophist. Decency, one would have thought,
would have forbidden any such enquiry concerning a man whose life was shadowed by the double
tragedy of his two orphan nephews. And they printed it, too, months after, although they omitted all
Sinnetts testimony. Truly, there were few depths known too deep for the 1885 SPR in its dealings with
the Theosophical Society, and the Indian subjects of the British Crown.
Hodgson (Dec. 85 Report, p.231) begins his comments on this incident: I shall now proceed to show
that there is nothing in the circumstances connected with Mr. Damodars astral journeys that renders it
difficult to suppose a prearrangement between him and Madame Blavatsky to make it appear that he took
them; and even that some of the circumstances suggest a suspicion of such an arrangement, H. then
quotes all the testimony of Olcott given above, to the conclusion, that is what made him so urgent. H.
continues:
Now in dealing with the real sequence of events, this last statement should be considered first. It
appears that before Colonel Olcott started on his tour, it was known at headquarters that when he reached
Moradabad, Mr. Shankar Singh would expect him to fulfill his promise and mesmerise the boys.
Where Hodgson gets his data, I do not know. I have none on the point. I have plenty to show that Olcott
did his business himself, quite apart from Madame Blavatsky, who rarely knew exactly where Olcott was,
let alone what he was doing. What is certain and in cold print is that the notice to Olcott to do no healing
was emphatic to the last degree: The President-Founder has received peremptory ORDERS from his
SUPERIORS not to undertake a single case of healing until further advised. Imagine that to devout
Indians! Olcott could be certain of no importunity except from the most despairing of men. Mr. Shankar
Singh had never been to Adyar, was unknown either to HPB or Damodar, was not even a Theosophist,
and Olcott tells of no communication but a letter. Who could have supposed that he and he alone among
the people at the towns all along the route would throw himself on the mercy of the Mahatmas and force
virtue out of them? The case, although pitiful, was not more so than hundreds that Olcott had treated.
Listen to this: a letter to the Indian Mirror, March 21. 83.
Sir, The presence of Colonel Olcott in Calcutta has afforded us a long-needed opportunity to test the
claims of mesmerism as a curative potency. We have attended at the Boitokkhana house of Maharajah Sir
J otendro Mohun Tagore Bahadur, K.C.S.I., the past seven or eight mornings, to see Colonel Olcott heal
9
the sick by the imposition of hands. Our experience has been of a very striking nature. We have seen him
cure an epileptic boy whose case had been given up in despair by his family after resorting to every other
known mode of treatment. The lad is of respectable parentage, his father being the Deputy Magistrate . . .
But a case that occurred this morning is of so remarkable a character as to prompt us to join in this letter
for the information of your readers. A young Brahmin was brought by the relatives of the epileptic boy
for treatment. He had a facial paralysis that prevented his closing his eyes, projecting his tongue and
swallowing liquids in the usual way. The paralysis of his tongue prevented his speaking without the
greatest efforts. In our presence and that of other witnesses, Colonel Olcott laid his ands upon him,
pronounced the command Aram Ho!, made some passes over his head, eyes, face and jaws, and in less
than five minutes the patient was cured. The scene that followed affected the bystanders to tears. For a
moment the patient stood, closing and opening his eyes and thrusting out and withdrawing his tongue.
And then, when the thought flashed upon him that he was cured, he burst into a fit of tears and joy and
with exclamations of gratitude that touched our hearts, flung himself on the ground at the Colonels feet,
embracing his knees and pouring out expressions of the deepest thankfulness. Surely no-one present can
ever forget this dramatic scene.
Yours etc., Srinauth Tagore.
Shautcorry Mukerji. N. Chandra Mukerji.
~ ~ ~
It was after this tour that the Colonels strength began to fail, and he says that he never again had such
power. And now listen to the dirt that Hodgson poured over him (SPR Report, P.233):
But what were the peculiar circumstances that would compel Colonel Olcott to resist the importuning of
Mr. Shankar Singh? Before starting on the tour [to Moradabad, etc.], Colonel Olcott had endeavoured to
heal certain sick persons at Poona by the voluntary transference of vitality. I was informed by a Poona
Theosophist that some 200 patients assembled, and that Colonel Olcott had striven mesmerically with
about 50 of them, the result being nil, whereupon the Poona Theosophists drew up a protest against Col.
Olcotts disgracing the Theosophical Society by professing to produce cures in the face of such
conspicuious failure.
I looked up the Theosophist for any word on this subject. No sign of any protest, but the most
respectful report from J udge N. D. Khandalvala, Pres. of the Poona Branch. Stressing Olcotts value as
President and the loss to the Society if he were invalided, he writes: About 20 or 25 persons were
treated magnetically, but there was scarcely one patient who was sensitive to any marked degree. We
were therefore not fortunate enough to see perfect cure effected. Two or three persons having pain in
some parts of the body were relieved of that pain, and in the case of two paralytics, a little more ease of
motion of the paralysed parts was induced . . . It is truly astonishing to see the President-Founder
patiently and perseveringly mesmerising a number of sufferers for hours together. The drain upon his
vital powers must be immense, and all our Fellows here are of opinion that he should give up this
practice that is sure to be injurious to his health . . . Our President has acquired through the report of his
cures a reputation that may be said to be dangerous to himself and to the Society, for people expect too
much and disappointment is sure to cause dissatisfaction.
Olcott having shown his self-sacrifice to the nth degree, his Master gave him a positive order a very
rare thing from a Master to a chela to stop.
10
Notwithstanding this, continues Hodgson, this meaning his own tale above, Colonel Olcott might
have been persuaded by Mr. Shankar Singh to the redeeming of his promise; it was, perhaps, for this
reason that a special injunction against his undertaking any cure was issued in the form of a Mahatmic
document that reached him through Mr. Damodar.
Mr. Singh was of no more importance than a hundred other people, the case was no more tragic than
many others, and the Colonels promise would be absolutely annulled in all Indian eyes by the
Mahatmas order. It is quite difficult to follow Hodgson in his twisted reasonings, if they may be called
such. He goes on to imply that the order was concocted by HPB. and Damodar for the sole purpose of
ensuring Olcotts refusal to Singh, and thus enabling them to carry out their plot!
In this way, Colonel Olcotts refusal was ensured. It may he observed that this important fact is not
disclosed in Colonel Olcotts deposition. The reason there given by him for his refusal was that he had
already within the previous year done too much of it for his health.
So, Colonel, now, enters the plot! A sentence ago, he was so out of it that his refusal had to be ensured by
a fraudulent Mahatmic communication, but now he is deliberately deluding the SPR by not disclosing
this important fact. The fact had been printed and circulated all over India, as Hodgson knew perfectly
well, for his Report shows how desperately, and vainly, he searched the pages of the Theosophist for
incriminating bits and pieces; in fact, we shall see soon that he had read the notice. Yet, he ignores the
notice itself and quotes from W. T. Brown, who was on tour with Colonel: Colonel Olcott . . . had been
ordered by his Guru to desist from treating patients until further notice.
I know not why Hodgson should act thus. I think his brain was so twisted that it is a wonder he did not
finally go insane; he certainly went wonderfully awry, had a row with the SPR. and went to America and
became a Spiritualist on grounds that most modern scientific Spiritualists would unhesitatingly qualify as
the territory of trance mind-reading. His reports of his experiments there touch the delirium of fanatical
belief induced by squeezing one and one until they split under the strain and make two and several; then
he calls the fragments mutually corroborating evidence. In the intervals he gave public lectures
denouncing Blavatsky.
Hodgson: But the most crucial point of the incident turned on Madame Blavatskys ignorance or
knowledge that the travellers were at Moradabad, and in reply to the definite question put by Mr. Myers,
Colonel Olcott declared that it was not known at headquarters that he was at Moradabad.
Neither was it! It might have been surmised that he was there; it could not be known-unless Damodar had
wired the news to HPB. Hodgson needed only to avail himself of HPBs authority to look up the
telegraph files, and no doubt, he did so. But, Damodar could not have wired about Singhs visit, for the
gentleman did not come until too late for any wire to get from Moradabad to Adyar.
Olcott, as well as lending his personal diary to assist Hodgson, told him to look up the dates of the tour
where they were published, in the Theosophist. Hodgson says It appeared from the programme that
Moradabad was to he reached on Nov. 9th, and left on Nov. 11th (and it appears from Colonel Olcotts
diary that it was reached on Nov. 9th, and left on Nov. 11th), so that it was known long previously at
headquarters that Colonel Olcott would be at Moradabad on Nov. 10th. Colonel Olcotts reason for
asserting that it was not known at headquarters that he was at Moradabad appears to be that, in the course
of his tours generally, he was constantly obliged to interrupt the previously-settled programme, and that,
therefore, no certain reliance could be placed on the programme for this particular tour. This, at least, is
11
the most favourable interpretation of the evidence he gave before the Committee.
Os evidence did not appear at all, but was exactly that: I, while on a tour was constantly obliged to
interrupt the previously-settled programme; and neither Madame Blavatsky nor Providence itself, unless
it had an obliging finger in the pie, could have known before the tour began whether Colonel Olcott
would be at Moradabad on Nov. 10th. This was one of the few tours that were run to schedule, doubtless
owing to the circumstance that the Colonels time was all his own, thanks to the Masters order. Of
course, the unerring Madame Blavatsky had also foreseen this!
Hodgson: I may note, however, that the following special proviso was attached to the list antecedently
published in the Theosophist: This programme will be as strictly adhered to as possible. Any change
necessitated by unforeseen contingencies will be signified by telegram. (Thus, in case of change of
programme, Mr. Damodar would have an adequate reason for visiting the telegraph office, and might
have sent a warning to Madame Blavatsky without exciting any suspicion. But the programme, as we
have seen above, was closely kept, and the circumstances throughout were admirably adapted for a pre-
arrangement.
~ ~ ~
I put an ice-cloth around my head and relieve my disgust with a burst of laughter. I bet few psychiatrists
have often more morbidly cruel and stupid stuff to deal with! As if Damodar were kept on a chain! And
special proviso! See Theosophist all through. All changes were notified by telegram on all tours to
Secretaries o f Branches, of course; and not by H.P.B., from Adyar, but by Colonel himself. Neither did
he usually send Damodar running such simple peons errands in strange towns!
~ ~ ~
In the middle of writing this, I verified some notes about Os tours. It took me about three hours, but two
and three-quarters went in reading the other pages. Surely there never was a more fascinating journal
than the Theosophist under the editorship of H.P.B.! If literary folk wish to know what she was about
Between the Plots, they may read this. It ought to be re-published verbatim, down to the advts. and with
nobodys cuts of the supposed impermanent; it is all permanent, the life of the Society was lived in it.
Well, I found that Olcotts Calcutta tour in March 1883, was twice altered; due to leave there on March
12th, he did not leave until April 4th; moreover HPB not having the programme herself, copied it from
the Calcutta Indian Mirror! The Ceylon J une tour programme can hardly be called a programme at all;
it was all altered and made up as they went along. The same applies to the South India tour, Aug.-Sept.,
the Colonel frequently breaking the settled route and going here and there on invitation. In compliance
with an invitation Col. O. went here; A deputation awaited the train there, at so-and-so, to beg him to
deliver a lecture. That is the sort of thing one finds all along.
Hodgson: Yet Colonel Olcott, after asserting that it was not known at headquarters that he was at
Moradabad, and giving a general reason for supposing that it could not be known, adds: All the elements
are against any procurement. His promise to the waiting Shankar Singh, the Chohans emphatic
prohibition bestowed on him by Damodar, the programme that pointed with a steady finger to Moradabad
on November 10th, the easy opportunity afforded to Mr. Damodar of guarding against a fiasco in case of
any unforeseen contingency all the elements are against any procurement!
12
And one can see the snigger that went around the SPR meeting when Hodgsons report was first read out
by Sidgwick, and the TS thus shown up by this thrilling wit as a den of humbugs, liars and fools. They
forgot the judge Time.
~ ~ ~
I conclude this section with Hodgsons crowning petard. In the message from the Shrine, the word
parties is used. Hodgson; p.233: The use of the word parties seems to be a suspicious circumstance.
Why should this general and rather odd word be used if it were not to cover possible but unforeseen
contingencies? The word boys would have been shorter and more natural. (See N. U. No. 1, Case 4.)
What contingencies? That the boys might have grown up in the meantime and become adult parties? Or,
that some other sick parties, at this very Moradabad, on this very Nov. 10th, at this very hour of five,
might have butted in, defied the order to Olcott to do no healing, and obligingly forced forced him to
waver so as to enable Madame Blavatsky and Damodar to carry out their plot?
Hodgson has built up his whole plot on Shankar Singh, so if the parties in the message had meant
anyone but Mr. Singhs boys, he would need to build an entirely different case! There is what can
happen when a mans malice outruns his reason.
10.
Dr. Hartmanns rose-coloured ribbon.
Before Dr. Hartmann joined the TS in 1883, he had been a Spiritualist for many years and had seen so
much phenomena that it took a good deal to surprise him. The common phenomenon of an apport
certainly could not, and he relates the following very drily. (Theosophist, April, 1884.)
On the morning of the 20th of Feb. 84, I received a curious Tibetan medal through Madame Blavatsky. I
then accompanied her on board the steamer on which she was to sail for Europe. On my return to the
shore, I went into a native jewellers shop and bought a locket to deposit my medal, but could not find a
chain long enough for my purpose. I then returned to my room, and paced the floor, studying what to do
in regard to the chain. I finally came to the conclusion that I would buy a rose-coloured ribbon. But
where to get it, being a stranger in Bombay; that was the question. My pacing the floor brought me again
in front of the open window, and there before me on the floor lay exactly the very silk ribbon, brand new,
and just the one I wanted. F. Hartmann. Bombay Feb. 21st, 84. As editor, pro tem of the Theosophist,
Hartmann published this in the April issue.
The SPR First Report, p.100 remarks: The case does not appear to us evidentially of much importance,
because it was at the open window that the ribbon fell, and Madame Coulomb was with Dr. Hartmann at
Bombay.
Coulomb pamphlet, p.80: We arrived at Bombay. I went to a friends house to stay, and Madame with
her suite put up in some rooms in Apollo Street. (The friend was a Mrs. Dudley.)
P.82. I remained some time on board. Dr. Hartmann, Mr. Lane-Fox and many others left; Miss Flynn
and myself remained very long after, but seeing no sign of the steamer starting, and knowing that Mrs.
Dudley was waiting for me at home, we took leave, and Madame, embracing me very warmly wished me
health and happiness. I went home, and told Mrs. Dudley all I suffered on this journey, and my opinion of
13
the Theosophical concern.
So, so far from obliging Madame Blavatsky by throwing ribbons into Dr. Hs room (on the third floor of
the hotel, he says, elsewhere), Mme. C. was not only not with Dr. Hartmann at Bombay, but was busy
blackguarding HPB.
11.
Babajees alias.
SPR Report, P.247. Hodgson: He seems to have no objection to assuming different characters, since at
this very time he represents two persons in the last Official Annual Report issued by the Theosophical
Society; that is, to say, he appears under two different names. On p.8 he appears as the delegate of the
Vizianagram Branch under the name of Babajee D. Nath, and on p.131, he appears as one of the
Assistant Recording Secretaries under the name of S. Krishna-swami. Yet Babajee D. Nath is the same
person as S. Krishna-swami, the latter being Mr. Babajees real name, according to his account to
myself.
And to a few others! The whole Society knew that Babajee D. Nath was the sunyasi or mystic name of
Krishnaswami; and the members from Vizianagram when at Adyar for the Convention would, on
applying to the Assistant Recording Secretary for any information, meet certainly one and the same
person! Alias! Not near so much of an alias as Timothy Shy or Y. Y. or lots of other people, for
such is the custom in India.
I may add, says the learned agent of the SPR., that Mr. Babajee, if I may judge from the account
(perhaps not very reliable) that he has given me of his changeful life, appears to be almost isolated and
entirely homeless apart from the Theosophical Society, and is, I think, eagerly ready, out of gratitude for
sheltering kindness received from Madame Blavatsky, to dispense on her behalf most freely with the
truth.
A. P. Sinnett, in The Occult World Phenomena (that should, by now, have run to fifty editions if the
beneficiaries of Blavatsky had done their duty; a brilliant piece of work!) writes on p.47: I protest
against the cruel misrepresentation of the position of Mr. Babaji, that occurs on p.247 (Hodgson Report).
He is not entirely homeless, apart from the Theosophical Society, in the sense in which alone the words
will be understood by the English reader. He is homeless as any man of respectable parentage may be if
he takes monastic vows. His family, who are well off, will gladly find him a home if ever he should want
it. But, in adopting a religious life he has, in accordance with custom, set himself apart from the world
and its ties.
In a letter to Sinnett (Letters of HPB to APS p.340), Babajee says: I send you herewith the Generals
(Morgan) letter stating that he saw my brother and Mr. Lane-Fox himself has seen one of my brothers . . .
Dr. Hbbe, Mohini and Miss Arundale too are in correspondence with my brother, who is well-known in
the University as an able graduate . . . Bertram and Arch. Keightley know that D.N. [Dhabagiri Nath] is
not the name given me by my physical selfs father.
~ ~ ~
Some day, the story of Babajee may strike the imagination of some new Bulwer Lytton, some occultist
writing fiction. Meanwhile, the canards perpetrated by the SPR go circulating all over the world.
14
NOTES.
There has been some misunderstanding of my remark about the limited editions of my volumes,
limited having been supposed to mean a couple of hundred. Not so, but 1,000; Vol. I. is now in second
1,000 but what is this among so many?
~ ~ ~
I have to thank Dr. Stokes for the gift of Peebles Around the World, kindly sent from Washington; Mr.
Albert Smythe for gift of Dr. Farquhars Modern Religious Movements in India, sent from Hamilton,
Ontario; Miss Edith Ward for loan of Moncure Conways Pilgrimage to the Wise Men of the East;
Mrs. Henderson for long loan of Theosophist first 6 vols, sent carriage and insurance paid both ways
from Victoria, B.C.; Mr. A. Trevor Barker for long loan of Lucifer, Vols. 1-8 and Path, Vols. I-X;
Mrs. Alice Cleather, of Darjeeling, for gift of her three books in defence of H.P.B.: H. P. Blavatsky, her
Life and Work for Humanity, H. P. Blavatsky as I knew her and A Great Betrayal, kindly sent
through the Blavatsky Association; Miss Elsie Savage of Point Loma for bringing me the file of Occult
Word to look over, and for excellently typed extracts from same.
I still lack W. T. Browns Life and Ruthnavelus article in The Philosophic Inquirer, April 8th, 1883,
very important and necessary. I need Olcotts People from the Other World; Isis Further Unveiled,
by the son of Ramaswamier; Madame Blavatsky, her tricks and her dupes, a Christian tract issued by
the Christ. Lit. Society of Madras; Ninth Annual Report of the T.S., 1885; and a lecture given by Mrs.
Gordon at Earls Court Lodge, Nov. 13th, 1892, on The Early Days of the T.S. in India.
~ ~ ~
I have secured the O.E. Library Critic from 1917 to date, and I strongly advise students to get the same.
It is sold at the low price of one pound, and contains innumerable data for the defence. Address: 1207 Q.
Street, N.W. Washington, D.C., U.S.A. (Takes up about 7 inches by 5 inches.)
~ ~ ~
A Society of the Friends of Blavatsky will be started next year. The Society will not be concerned with
anything but the practical defence of H.P.B. I shall take no official position, but edit N. U. as the organ.
~ ~ ~
The general notion that H.P.B.s personal friends are all resting in Devachan is wrong. I am now in active
correspondence with seven of them, and doubtless there are more. And a miraculously lively and
charming bunch they are! Im getting priceless stories and bits of first-hand information, photos,
autographs and copies of letters. And here is a strange coincidence: last Sunday, I had spent a worrying
two hours over a certain subject. On Monday morning, came a letter from India enclosing a copy of a
letter from H.P.B. on this very subject.
~ ~ ~
New Universe appears in a cover this time, and I have had covers printed for No. I. Covers may be had
for 1d. which pays for postage. A third number of N. U. will appear before Vol. 3, Defence of
15
Madame Blavatsky.
~ ~ ~
Messrs. Hare, I presume, have sent me their latest bark from Letchworth. Having shown, with chapter
and verse, that they are mostly wrong about everything and everyone and that they maliciously distort
and misquote, I have no more to say to them. If Mr. J inarajadasa replies to them, as I suppose he will,
that he was in error about the Disinherited, that may silence Messrs. Hare, but I doubt it. Anyway, I
should only notice them again if they were to bring me a correction of some error in my data, when I
would print the correction with thanks.
~ ~ ~
On advice from various quarters, I decided to send the Defence vols. for general review. Thus, I am
now relieved of the charge I heard from both Theosophist and secular friends that I was prejudicing the
circulation. Below are extracts from reviews received mostly before this. The very first review came from
The Workers Monthly, a Co-op and Labour paper, published at Farnham, Surrey and widely circulated
through the counties.
Defence of a woman of genius. Mrs. Beatrice Hastings wields a trenchant pen in repelling some of the
attacks made on a very remarkable woman, and she is the more effective because she is no blind
admirer.
The Theosophical Forum (English Section). We strongly recommend all members of the English
Section to obtain this powerful defence of the Life and Work of H.P.B.
The Canadian Theosophist. Mrs. Beatrice Hastings has come like the spring of the year . . . and tells us
the old old story of the goodness and truth and beauty of Madame Blavatsky and her Message.
O.E. Library Critic. I thought I had sucked about all the juice out of the Hare lemon, but I deceived
myself. I recommend the reading of this section [The Mahatma Letters and Messrs. Hare, Vol. 1.] to
Dion Fortune and the editor of the Occult Review, who have passed favourably on the Hare book,
evidently after a most superficial reading.
The Theosophical Forum (Point Loma). There is a glow comes over one as he becomes absorbed in
these pages, and I dont suppose there is a single dyed-in-the-wool Theosophist who wont get what
Americans call a kick out of reading this brilliant championing of the Great Theosophist.
The New English Weekly. The rights and wrongs of the bitter war, who were the liars and who were not,
has never been settled, for one of the protagonists, the S.P.R., was in those days vowed to uphold
materialism at all costs. Hence Mrs. Hastings very serious work . . . will be of interest . . .
The Right Review. We are very pleased to see the defence of Madame Blavatsky undertaken by one who
has a genuine reputation in the world of letters . . . Madame Blavatsky, at the lowest estimate, was an
astonishing genius . . . If her mahatmas and their letters were forgeries, all the better: for then she was
herself their creator . . . Persons who regard the Secret Doctrine as a mass of plagiarisms have never read
it, unified as it is by her peculiar and excellent style.
16
The American Theosophist. Noteworthy indeed is this small volume, slight only in format, but
commanding in its ringing demand for justice for a great person, H.P.B. . . Every Theosophist will
welcome this critical examination and dissection of the baseless assaults on our revered Founder.
Light (Editorial). It may cheer Mrs. Hastings to know that there are at least a few ourselves among
them outside the Theosophical Society (the members of which will, we suppose, give her a large
measure of support) who will be delighted if she achieves complete success . . . There are doubtless many
Spiritualists . . . who will be delighted if the stigma of Charlatan can be finally disassociated from
Madame Blavatskys name.
News and Notes. Full of interesting and authentic facts.
Buddhism in England. Mrs. Hastings is the latest warrior to take up arms against the attack upon the
personal integrity of H. P. Blavatsky. It is right that those who accept the teachings of the Masters and
their agent, H.P.B., should rally to defend her name.
~ ~ ~
Path, received too late for quotation in this issue.
~ ~ ~
Future vols. and N. U. will be sent to journals that have reviewed previous issues and forwarded copies
of review. Readers please send me any cuttings they come across.
1
NEW UNIVERSE
Try
Vol. 1. No. 3. February, 1938. 6d.
Editor - Beatrice Hastings.
This paragraph may interest mainly readers who sign F.T.S.
What does the following mean?
Can you do anything to help on the Society? Want me to speak frankly? Well, I say No: neither
yourself nor the Lord Sang-Yias Himself so long as the equivocal position of the Founders is not
proved due to fiendish malice and systematic intrigue could help it on. (Mahatma M. to Sinnett in
1881. Mahatma Letters.) [M.L. Letter received about February 1882, p.254]
~ ~ ~
On p.15 is reproduced a public notice recently sent out to the Friends of Madame Blavatsky. The idea of
this association to defend her reputation has, however, been circulating privately since October, in India
and elsewhere, and, already two Overseas groups have started, one in Melbourne and one in Canada. The
first provincial group to start is in Liverpool. This is fine. Before next New Year, we shall have put a
girdle round about the earth.
~ ~ ~
Remember the words of Anatole France in the funeral oration of Zola:
Emile Zola had conquered fame; his reputation was secure; he was enjoying the fruits of his toil, when
suddenly, and of his own free will, he bade goodbye to his work to a life of lettered ease because
he knew that there is no serenity save in justice no repose save in Truth . . . Let us not pity him
because he suffered. Let us envy him! Let us envy him because his great heart won him the proudest of
destinies. He was a moment in the conscience of man.
None of us, the Friends of Madame Blavatsky, will wear any such palm individually. But, collectively,
we may become a moment in the conscience of man. Some of us can put all other work aside and give
our pens, some can give money but what every F.T.S. can do is to devote all the time he or she now
spends on profiting by Blavatsky to vindicating her. How? By studying her case. There is no other way to
begin! By demanding that Lodge lectures shall be devoted to the stuff of her defence. Before I get
through with my volumes, the whole of the charges will have been dealt with. I have resolved to go on
until every attack has been met. While this is going on, the Friends of Blavatsky will learn and spread
abroad what they learn, get sure of their facts and put them to others in a convincing way according to the
mental capacity. Take a short case first, and ram it home. There are few persons who cannot be led to
take an interest in a case of injustice, but it is of no use to expect the world to defend Blavatsky and
that is our aim! unless it is made acquainted with the case.
FRIENDS.
Get groups together and get to know the case yourselves, then you can tell it on public platforms to other
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people and in time we shall have the public in all countries clamouring for justice for Blavatsky. No need
to meddle with the secrets of the phenomena just need to prove first that on the evidence brought in
the SPR Report, there is not only no case, but that the Report itself is a tissue of falsehood, suppression
of facts, deliberate twisting and expression of mere slanderous opinion. The aim of the Friends of
Madame Blavatsky is to get that Report publicly withdrawn and we shall carry on a campaign until it is
withdrawn.
~ ~ ~
A friend has sent me Chestertons Autobiography wherein he refers to Madame Blavatsky as a coarse,
vigorous old scallywag. I am the more content to have long considered Chesterton as a dangerous
J esuitical buffoon whose Catholic confession was secretly made long before the public he wrote for was
allowed to suspect it, and whose cunning Loyolaisms together with word-foppery that many mistook for
true paradox, worked enormous mischief with the brains of his generation, beginning with his own
brother, Cecil, a better man than himself. His Autobiography, with its indecent slander on a literary
genius incomparably beyond him, is not a piece of writing at all, not a work that any critic would
preserve for the style, but is rattled here and laboured there like the confidences of a giggling Fanny or a
club bore. This interminable clown to speak of the writer of Blue Mountains, The Caves and J ungles
of Hindostan and Nightmare Tales, to name only works that all the world can, and will in time,
appreciate, as a coarse old scallywag! Time will forget him, while her fame can only increase.
~ ~ ~
And, O Theosophists, that is still another attack to add to my long shelf of such; and gone into sixteen
impressions among a public that, so far, knows no better. There has been a quite new crop in the last two
or three years. Come along and get to work to stop it once and for all.
~ ~ ~
The Adyar Theosophist for December contains a review by J .R. of Defence (at least I presume so,
as I have received advance proofs of a review). The notice refers to but one volume and gives neither
price nor address. Unless Indian readers care to risk a blank cheque to me at the rather large town of
Worthing, they will remain in the dark. True, The Hindu of Madras, the biggest paper in South India,
gave Vols. 1 and 2 a splendid review on Nov. 21st, with both price and full address, so most educated
Indians will be aware that the case of Madame Blavatsky is being seriously taken up. True, also, that
scores and scores of copies are now circulating between Bombay and Kalimpong. True, again, that Adyar
has recently sent an order by Air-mail.
However, the review is not in the least calculated to make anyone rush to buy even the one volume
mentioned, let alone send blank cheques to Worthing. I wont go into the pinchbeck, patronising style,
merely giving a sample. My detailed exposure of the Hares with some few hundred hard-won data is
referred to as a tilt. This is extremely impertinent, but I have more serious fish to fry.
The reviewer, J .R., remarks complacently that Mrs. Hastings has no access to the many private
documents at Adyar. This a very foolish remark, as it might be taken to mean not only that I have not the
equipment for the defence, but that Adyar is deliberately withholding matter that would help to vindicate
Madame Blavatsky. However, I reply to J .R. that the case against the SPR can be proved without the
addition of a single document beyond what is now in circulation. In fact, entirely new documents, unless
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they could be verified against already published matter, whether produced by any friendly group or by
the SPR, could scarcely be accepted by either side. Too long a time has passed and the documents still
concealed have gone through too many hands to be of much weight in the case. I should be very wary of
using such. I receive frequently new personal testimonies to the character and phenomena of HPB, and
shall publish them some time; but that is a different matter. With the publication of the Mahatma
Letters, the case for the defence really closes.
Next. Four correspondents, including two editors of Theos. journals, have sent me privately half a dozen
corrections of data, leaving it to my discretion to make the corrections where these would be most
effective, in the volumes or New Universe, where the defence is being collected. J .R. takes a
different line and corrects me in his own pages. On the ground that Mrs. Hastings likes correct
documentation, his readers are given three alleged samples of my inaccuracy. They are informed that
Mrs. Gordon had already met HPB in Allahabad in 1879 before the Simla meeting, something I might be
supposed to know, really! I saw that the sentence was ambiguous but considered that my thesis was in no
way affected and so left it. Next, I am instructed as to my error, serious enough to use up several lines in
the T., in alleging that HPB suffered from shortness of breath in the heat and dust of October at
Lahore. It appears that Lahore is not very hot although there is always dust. Well, I take the dust and
let the heat go to whatever it may be above that of Simla whence HPB had come.
The reviewers third effort to be helpful in defending Blavatsky is, however, one that corrects not only
myself but a higher authority, namely Mahatma K.H. There is no record, writes J .R., that H.P.B. left
Simla in a state of nerves and heart-break (Vol. 1. p.16.), and that therefore she developed a raging fever
[I did not say so. I said running for a break-down.] fevers are easily provoked in India, a chill is
enough.
I drew my conclusion from several records. 1. Major Hendersons ultimatum, (O.D.L. Vol. 2, p.235).
This public challenge, almost denunciation, by the all-powerful Chief of Police, may have made HPB
inclined to sing and dance, or even made no impression at all on her heart and nerves; but in this case we
should have to conclude that she cared nothing about the future of the TS. or about the result of Olcotts
appeal to the Indian Govt. to cease treating her as a suspicious character. 2. The attacks in the
Englishman and the Statesman and other papers on the Oct. 3rd phenomena. 3. The cooling-off of
Simla people and the general verdict, recorded by Olcott, that she was in league with the Devil. 4. Her
own letter to Sinnett, and finally, 5. The Mahatmas post-script the which I quoted in full on p.21. He
says: This dangerous nervous crisis was brought on by a series of unmerited insults . . . Her reason as
well as her life was in danger . . .
I think it is now made fairly clear that HPBs heart must have been somewhat sorely wounded before
leaving Simla and that her nerves had long been stringing up to the crash that came at Lahore. However,
she caught the fever, it was not this that brought the Mahatma to her side but the fact that she had
suffered mentally so intensely since Oct. 3rd, when the Henderson quarrel started the series of insults,
that she was on the point of losing her mind.
I trust that since J .R. has corrected the Mahatma, he will correct himself now where this would be most
effective, namely in the pages where he has led the Indian Theosophists to distrust my accuracy. And I
take the occasion to beg Theosophical reviewers, at least, to be very sure that their corrections are, firstly,
serious ones, and secondly correct, before publishing such and thus putting me to the waste of time,
space and cost of printing in making a public reply.
4
~ ~ ~
I have been informed by a Theosophical leading light that my books are over the heads of the average
Theosophist, who knows nothing of the history of the Society. I regret it, but suppose that the average
Theosophist is so ignorant . . . whose fault is this? Not mine. Anyway, they now have a chance to learn,
let them learn. I find Theosophists wide-awake, remarkably so; some only rather useless because their
minds need clearing of a lot of pretty-coloured fog. Here is the very best chance for these last to sharpen
their brains. Of course I cannot write with an eye to the really ignorant. My books are written to
command the attention of the most cultured people, in and out of any TS., and to challenge effectively
the remarkably cunning and clever people on the enemy side. Some of the latter, anyway, know already
much of what I am bringing out. It must not be supposed that everyone in the SPR has overlooked the
fact that no telegrams were produced; or that Olcotts testimony was practically solid; or that Solovyoff
faked the translation of HPBs confession. Of course all these and hundreds of other things are secretly
known. The knowers have merely lain low, and will continue to lie low until absolutely forced into the
open.
It is not my business to teach Theosophists ignorant of their history how to defend their benefactor, but
the business of those in charge of the Lodges. Let these take one case at a time and master it. That will do
more to give the ignorant real confidence in Madame Blavatsky than any amount of hymn-singing to our
beloved HPB: the difference between a flag-waving bystander, who may run away, and the drummer in
the ranks who will not. It is shocking that such lambs should be allowed to suppose that they can float
into Nirvana with a copy of the S.D. under their arms while the agent of the teaching can be publicly
called a coarse old scallywag, without a protest on their part. And, if the theory of individual karma
prove to be true, they must unconsciously be laying up for themselves a life where they, too, will be
accused and left undefended. In any case, they will leave behind them a terrible injustice in the astral
ocean to affect somebody. How can the world believe that Theosophists really believe in karma and the
effects of causes and the oneness of humanity so long as they leave the atmosphere fouled by an injustice
that it is their own particular, unescapable duty to redress?
~ ~ ~
It is not the province of this magazine to review books, even when kindly sent, unless they contain
something really helpful to the Defence. Most of the so-called historical books published of late years are
lifeless paraphrasings (amounting to blank plagiarism, for they worsen the matter) of Olcotts
delightful Old Diary Leaves, Countess Wachtmeisters Reminiscences, Sinnetts Incidents and
other early books that belong to literature, because they are well-written and are first-hand narratives.
However many faults there may be in ODL, this can never be surpassed as a record, and anyone who
tries to do it over again or to do anything but correct material errors in a commentary, or add from the
original diary, is simply tinkering. His politics are a separate question.
Miss Neffs book, Personal Memoirs of H. P. Blavatsky (Rider, 18s.), although of little use to the
advanced student will, I presume, find a rightful place in every Theosophical Lodge where there are
members needing enlightenment about H.P.B. Miss Neff has had the tact to leave the quotations she uses
mostly without comment. The book is so likely to lead many to the sources themselves that I feel quite
disinclined to criticise it in any way but the sympathetic. Miss Neff, as I know, has done a fine bit of
work on the chronology of the Mahatma Letters. Some of her dates are out, but this seems to be due to
her lack of material such as the SPR and other documents. She ought to be subsidised to do nothing but
research, and I take the occasion to offer her scripts of anything I have, the which is now a very
5
respectable HPB library.
~ ~ ~
I continue the defence of H.P.B. and Company.
Case 12.
Examination of fraud letters by Theosophists.
Since writing Vol. 2, I have been able to secure a copy of the 1904 reproduction of the original 1884
articles, Collapse of Koot Hoomi, whereas previously I had had to work on a typed summary. This
republication, twenty years later, was undertaken by the Christian Literature Society of Madras for the
avowed motive that certain facts should be brought to the notice of those who are ignorant of what
transpired some twenty years ago. These people are evidently quite aware that so long as Madame
Blavatsky may be slandered, the Society may be made to bear the brunt, she being dead. I am, by the
way, quite against the absurd dictum, De mortuis nil nisi bonum. The bad frequently become infinitely
more harmful when dead, their evil lives after them; and it is impossible to hale them into police court or
libel court. If we might not expose the secret villainy of the departed, neither logically, could we defend
any dead or, even, living victim. I have said a few things about the late lamented Monsieur and Madame
Coulomb and their colleague, Hodgson, and a few about their victim; if they might not be attacked, I
could not defend her.
She was thirteen years dead, anyway, when the C.L.S. of Madras thought it desirable to reprint the
original Christian College Magazine attack on her. These articles shall have a section to themselves in
some future volume. For the moment, I am only interested in correcting myself. I said (Vol. 2, p.28) that
only one fraud letter had been shown to Theosophists for examination, namely, a letter wherein Major-
Gen. Morgan was named. There has been considerable chicanery on the part of the enemy concerning the
question as to whether the letters were ever shown, and I think I have now got to the bottom of the
mystery.
It appears that four letters were shown to Theosophists at Adyar, after General M. had seen his letter. But
what were these four letters? One was the same letter Morgan had seen and which he pronounced a
forgery! The second was a long letter from HPB to the Coulomb from Paris (Vol. 2, App. I, 4,): but this
letter was never disputed! The third was a letter written on the back of another, containing no fraud
and, also, not disputed. The fourth was the letter concerning the Maitland cigarette (Vol. 2, p.37); it
will be noted that I considered the main part, or first sheet, of this letter as certainly genuine and, I add,
actually written by HPB. Curious that the Rev. Patterson should have picked out just this one to present!
It was the one that contained the note on the fly-leaf, rejected by J udge Gribble as unsafe, and the
fraud slip of paper that he apparently found beneath legal consideration as he ignored it completely.
The SPR used it.
And that is what the Rev. Patterson in the Methodist Times, Oct. 31, 89, called showing the letters!
The missionaries showed just enough to be able to tell the half-truth that is so difficult to expose.
(Note. I thought I had made it clear (p.16) that the fraud screed translations in Vol. 2 are as given by
Mme. C. I altered nothing. Also, double columns are exactly as she printed them.)
6
Case 13. The Kiddle incident.
(Refer Vol. 1, Section 2.) In the First (P. and C.) SPR Report, we read on p.22: Mr. Massey showed that
quoted sentences seem to have been ingeniously twisted into a polemical sense, precisely opposite to that
in which they were written . . . but the odd coincidence remains that words should have been originally
quoted most of which were capable of being pieced together into a coherent meaning other than that
intended by their original author.
A feat unparalleled! Try it. Read a page of a book and then write that page in such a manner that you can,
later, make a coherent article by adding here and there half a page more that gives a coherent meaning
other than that intended by the original author. I have failed to be able to do it even in one moderately
long sentence.
Incidentally, you may search and expect to find, but you will not find the remark above (probably by Mr.
Myers) taken from the First Report, in the Second; it was suppressed naturally.
Of course, the Mahatmas own explanation that the chela, in precipitating, had omitted the polemical
parts of his dictation, is the only one possible. The omitted passages were only supplied three years later!
And the letter, when made whole, not only reads coherently but expresses what we know to have been his
usual personal point of view.
Case 14. First versus Second SPR Report.
Re Damodars Moradabad flight (New U. No. 1, Case 4 (iv) and No. 2, Case 9.).
First Report, p.34: The dates and circumstances, as described, scarcely admit of previous arrangement.
(That is, plot between HPB and D.).
Second Report, p.209: For Mr. Damodars astral journeys I could find no additional evidence which
rendered pre-arrangement in any way more difficult than it appeared to be under the circumstances
narrated to us at the time of our First Report, when we considered that collusion between Madame
Blavatsky and Mr. Damodar was not precluded.
For face-saving! I think that the reason why the SPR adjudged HPB as the champion fraud of all the ages
was because they had committed themselves so deeply in the First Report, even in the self-revealing
hedgings and manglings in which we have it that they could only regain their position as esprits forts
by allotting her a title to permanent remembrance as an impostor. The remembrance will be permanent
all right, but not on those grounds.
Case 15. Mahatma Ms Portrait.
First Report, p.35: The production of the portrait of Colonel Olcotts Master, Mahatma M. is interesting,
because this is the portrait from which other persons recognise Mahatma M. when they see him or his
supposed apparition. We can hardly regard it as evidence, however, without knowing more about the
gentleman who is said to have drawn it.
Perhaps if they had known the gentlemans name and address (it was M. Harisse, O.D.L. Vol. 1,
p.370), that would have made some difference to the fact that the persons who saw Mahatma M. both in
7
person and in astral recognised him from the portrait! The only difference would have been that we
should have had this gentleman handed down to us as one more confederate.
Case 16. Professor Smiths No chance letter.
(Refer Vol. 2, p.51). Prof. Smith: She then desired us to sit down and in so doing took my hands in both
of hers.
In a few seconds, a letter fell at my feet. Quoted in First Report, p.109.
Committees remark: There is the additional possibility in this case that Madame Blavatsky may have
thrown it.
Even if she had only thrown it with her disengaged feet without the Professor seeing her, that would have
added something to her title to permanent remembrance.
Case 17.
Testimony to Damodars London astral flight, May, 1884.
I do not possess the J ournal of the SPR, 1884-5-6, and I should very much like to have it; I tremble when
relying on notes and extracts. However, I now quote it from the SPR First Report, and hope that their
extract is exact. Their shorthand notes are doubtfully so. The Committee must have cursed this 1884
J ournal that gives them away appallingly as having once countenanced Blavatsky and Company and
psychic phenomena in general.
The J ournal of the Society for Psychical Research for J une, in an account of a meeting held at the
Garden Mansion, May 28th, contains the following passage (pp.75-6):
At the conclusion of the Literary Committees Report, some further discussion was raised on Colonel
Olcotts evidence, and Mr. E. D. Ewen, of Chattisgarh, C.P. India, stated that he had himself a few days
ago (on Friday, May 23rd, at about 10 p.m.) received a visit from Mr. Damodar in the astral body. He
(Mr. Ewen) had gone to an upstairs room, at 77 Elgin Crescent, to replenish his tobacco-pouch. He was
in the act of doing so from a store of tobacco in a drawer, when he suddenly perceived Damodar standing
beside him. He recognised Damodar distinctly, having previously known him personally in India. His
first impression was that Damodar had come to see Colonel Olcott, who was in the house at the time. He
(Mr. Ewen) rushed out on the landing, and called to Colonel Olcott. As he stood on the landing, just
outside the door of the room in which he had seen Damodar, Damodar appeared to pass through him, to
emerge from the room without sensible contact, although the door was not wide enough to admit of a
normal exit while Mr. Ewen stood in front of it, without a collision, which Mr. Ewen must have felt.
After thus apparently passing through him, the form of Damodar descended the stairs for some little way
and then seemed to disappear through a closed window.
The Committee, with Olcotts assistance, sent a telegram to Damodar asking for confirmation. To this D.
refused to reply, but he wrote to HPB expressing his decided unwillingness to reveal his own intimate
proceedings to the SPR. (A pity he was ever persuaded otherwise!) However, the Committee, the which
at that period did not include either Hodgson or that most suitable spouse of Professor Sidgwick, Mrs.
Sidgwick (this couple, along with the Coulombs, probably did more to retard psychical research than all
the other inquisitors and their tools together) the Committee wrote: Common fairness forbade us
8
positively to conclude that . . . Mr. Damodars reluctance to divulge his own affairs to satisfy our
curiosity was merely a simulated feeling. There was still a remnant of gentlemanliness among the
Committee, even if their faculty for examining evidence might not have excited very considerably the
envy of a common juryman.
In the Second Report, Hodgsons, Mrs. Sidgwick was selected to deal with this distressing incident. She
does it in her usual style, which is something between an oiled butchers knife and a rusty saw. She
writes: Mr. Ewen, who is a Scotch gentleman of honourable repute, whose organisation is highly
nervous, saw Mr. Damodar (with whom he was acquainted) in astral form, as he supposed, on May
23rd, 1884, in London. On his mentioning this at a meeting of our Society on May 28th, Mr. Damodar
was at once telegraphed to by Colonel Olcott (Mr. Myers being present) in the following words: Olcott
to Damodar, Adyar, Madras. Have you visited London lately? Write Myers full details. To this telegram
no reply was received, from which it is a natural inference that Mr. Damodar was unaware of the vision,
though he may have had other reasons for his silence.
No common fairness for Mrs. Sidgwick! In her view, if a man does not wish to divulge his personal
experiences, it is a natural inference that he is humbugging. But note how neatly she denounces Myers
for disgracing the SPR by this telegram attempt to verify a phenomenon! This irritation with Myers
appears frequently throughout the Second Report. The rest of the Committee were not out to prove that
psychical phenomena were possible but to prove that all psychics, and especially Madame Blavatsky,
were frauds. The tale of persecuted mediums during this period is a long long one. Hapless wretch who
ever got into Professor Sidgwicks hands! And such a nice man too, as the song says so smooth and
reasonable to talk to. Disastrous person.
But suppose that Damodar had replied? We should merely have found Mr. Ewen suspected of complicity
like the Thakur Saheb at Moradabad. When donkeys are brass-clad, to quote HPB, they dont
stick at much, as we have seen rather often by now.
Case 18. Norendra Nath Sen and Hodgson.
N. N. Sen was editor of the Indian Mirror, a big Calcutta daily, and belonged to one of the well-known
Bengal families. He frequently said that phenomena should be kept secret, but to help Madame
Blavatsky, he consented to give Hodgson a few examples he had seen. Hodgson picks out one, and of
course one that could not penetrate the brass-clad. But (p.376) he says: Mr. N. N. Sen did not appear to
me to have been much impressed by phenomena. Note the contemptuous inverted commas. Mr. Sen
would not have endorsed them! He himself lived among phenomena, and he did not need HPB at hand,
either. He never doubted her at all, but was one of her most devoted friends. In Letters from the
Masters (Vol. 2, p.135) his son is quoted as follows: Sometimes late at night, when correcting proofs,
Norendra Nath Sen after a hard days work would fall asleep over his proofs. More than once, when he
woke up, he found the proofs corrected in blue pencil. A blue pencil was usually used by Mahatma KH
and his chelas. And Hodgson, not daring to take any other liberty with this very influential Bengalee
editor, writes phenomena in scrubby inverted commas next to his name, as though Mr. Sen might have
approved . . .
Case 19. HPB and the Telegraph files.
I call all these points cases, for convenience, although many of them are separate pieces of evidence,
9
picked out as affecting the more notorious of the charges; they will be indexed in NU, No.7, and
correlated in due course. (A very good exercise for those to whom they are quite new would be to make
the chronology and index themselves. The reason I know the M.L. so well is because I was obliged to
search for the chronology. It must be nearly time now, though, for a chronological edition of M.L..)
Madame Blavatskys note on Olcotts deposition of May 11th: Why not write to some trustworthy
unprejudiced person in India to examine all those telegrams, original messages, and even search in the
Records of those dates other telegrams from Damodar and myself? I give full permission to do so. I shall
be very glad as glad as in the case of Mahatma K.Hs telegram from J helum (Vol. 1, p.16) to give
an opportunity to settle finally all such questions of conspiracy for, indeed, it does become rather
monotonous. H. P. Blavatsky. (Refer NU, No. 2, p.10.)
*
(Note. The application form on the notice sent out may be cut off, or, preferably, copied.)
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THE FRIENDS OF MADAME BLAVATSKY.
Everyone who believes that an injustice has been done to Madame Blavatsky by the Report of the Society
for Psychical Research is welcome among the Friends. No belief but that is required of anyone, neither
are we connected in any way with any other society under the sun.
There has been sufficient welcome shown to the Defence by groups and persons entirely independent of
any Theosophical organisation to prove that the consciousness of an injustice done is wide-spread.
Indeed, we have received sympathy from quarters that might have been supposed to be rather
antagonistic to H.P.B. But there is nothing that the human conscience condemns so intuitively as an
injustice and, when such injustice has been wilfully repeated and aggravated and the friends of the victim
boycotted and silenced, whereas the enemies be allowed full voice at length, the cycle of redressment
comes around, and help flows in from all sides.
The aim of The Friends of Madame Blavatsky is to bring pressure on the Society for Psychical Research
to withdraw their Report that denounced her as an impostor. The S.P.R. produced no evidence that she
was an impostor. The case, if tried today on the basis of that Report, would be thrown out by any of our
Law J udges, if, indeed, a single Public Prosecutor could be found to present it. We intend to stir the
world-public until educated people in every country begin to demand that justice shall be done. When
that Report is withdrawn, then we shall be satisfied because every new attack on Madame Blavatsky is
based on that Report and, once it is withdrawn, there will be no more attacks for the good reason that no
editor or publisher would look at one. Thereafter, we can leave the fame of H.P.B. to make its own way
with a fair field before it.
The registration fee for The Friends of Madame Blavatsky will be only one shilling, so as to permit of the
widest possible membership, but Members will subscribe as much more as they are able. Members of
already existing Groups may, if they please, send a collective list through some selected person, with
names, addresses and subscriptions; cards of membership will be sent individually. Donations to any
amount, none too small or too large, may be sent. We shall need money for this campaign; for the best
public lecturers, hire of halls, printing and advertisements etc. We are now looking about for a London
Headquarters, and meanwhile, names and fees should he sent to: Mrs. Hastings, 4 Bedford Row,
Worthing, Sussex, England.
*
NOTES.
Vol. 3 will be delayed for two reasons. Firstly, because Rao Saheb G. S. Chetty, who was the young
architect of the Occult Room, is going to have a Plan made for me; and, secondly, because New
Universe must receive much more attention than hitherto. People outside the Theosophical groups have
been very quick to see that this wee basilisk will cause more alarm in the enemy camp than the volumes
themselves. These last might be ignored and allowed to go silently out of print. But New Universe will
not go out of print but go into print, constantly, until the victory is won. Now, although Theosophists
have bought the volumes in a way that has simply astonished me for I ignoring the Movement and
knowing almost nobody, reckoned I might have to wait several years before making such an impression
although, I say, there is now scarcely one group that has not sent repeated orders for the volumes, they
have not ordered anything like an equal quantity of N.U. They may regret this soon enough, for the
11
Defence is continued in New Universe, orders come in from mysterious, anonymous quarters, and
editions are limited. The Lodge that lets the occasion go by will not be able to romp in later on and get
what it lacks; and some Presidents will get their hair pulled.
So many people have sent in subscriptions, in spite of my warning that the magazine would be irregular
for some months, that I have decided that the thing is solid enough at least to justify me in taking
subscriptions. The subscription for twelve numbers, starting from any number, is six shillings and
sixpence, post free, and three shillings and threepence for six numbers. Cheques and orders payable to
Beatrice Hastings. Usual terms to the Trade.
~ ~ ~
I have to thank Mr. C. J . Ryan for sending me some extracts from the Point Loma archives; Mr. Cyrus
Field Willard of San Diego for many useful and interesting recollections, with dates and names of
persons and places; Mr. Harold Cox of Ontario for two copies of his Who wrote the March-Hare attack
on the Mahatma Letters?; Mr. G. for offer to pay cost of 100 Press and Library copies of New
Universe, No. 3; several of H.P.B.s old Friends, who wish to remain unnamed for the present, for
generous donations towards printing and other costs; Mrs. X. for the gift of one dozen sets sent to
international Public Libraries and, in this connection, I mention that the Director of one of the largest
American libraries has written me a personal letter, saying, We are very glad indeed, to have these
books; Mr. Oderberg, of Melbourne for offer to send any extracts I may need from early Australian
papers; Mr. T. B. Lawrie for similar offer as regards South Africa; and I close by asking for several
Indian correspondents willing to do the same out there, and for someone to make extracts from British
Museum.
~ ~ ~
Errata. Vol. 1, p.21, line 10. Read weeks for days. P. 25, line 11. Branches had not been actually
formed, but groups had been made and the Branches were formed soon after Olcotts return from Ceylon.
p.103. App.2. The Swamis testimony did not appear in Theosophist but in Lucifer, Sep. 1889.
Incidentally, if the Swamis testimony were not trustworthy, he must somehow have had access to the
Tatya letter of 1886 that was long kept almost a dead secret, and to information about Madame Blavatsky
that had not been published. As he was a stranger at Adyar and, of course, not a Theosophist, his
marvellously accurate information can only be accounted as personal testimony from Tibet. New
Universe, No.2. p.18, bottom par. Next time I have to verify notes from HPBs Theosophist, I shall
take precautions against being lured off from my business to read the other pages! Olcotts first Calcutta
tour apparently was not altered before March 12th; I cannot find that he did return to and leave Calcutta
as scheduled in the Indian Mirror, but must take it for granted that he did. The second tour, however,
was twice delayed because Colonel hopped off to establish Branches at J essore and Narail, and doubtless
made a few more hops as he only returned on the 30th April instead of the 18th, as announced.
I shall not make typographical corrections as a rule. I get into sufficient hot water with my printer for
overlooking things without drawing his attention myself; but Vol. 2, p.95, line 20, contains an error that
may baffle some readers. Read hostility for hospitality.
I see that impostor has been spelled with an e in the notice sent out to Friends of Madame Blavatsky.
However the word were spelled, it couldnt be spelled right in connection with Madame Blavatsky, but I
correct it, registering my dislike of reading the word at all.
12
~ ~ ~
New Universe and Defence of Madame Blavatsky, Vols. 1 and 2, may now be obtained by American
readers from The H.P.B. Library, 348 Foul Bay Road, Victoria, B.C.; The O.E. Library Critic, 1207 Q.
Street, N.W., Washington, D.C.; The Theosophical Press, Olcott, Wheaton, Illinois; The Theosophical
University Press, Point Loma, California.
English readers can order from me, or from The Theosophical Publishing Co., 3 Percy Street W.C.1.; or
from The Theosophical Bookshop, 68 Great Russell Street, W.C.1.; or through any agent or bookseller.
I am arranging for Indian and Australian depots.
Holland is supplied by the well-known firm of Dishoeck, Bussum, Holland.
~ ~ ~
N.U. No.4 will devote a few pages to The Mysterious Madame by Ephesian. Also, in No.5, I shall
put a case and ask readers to detect the flaws in the charge; correct answers will be published in No.6.
~ ~ ~
I calculate that this Defence will take from three to seven, or even to ten, years, according to the effort of
world-wide propaganda made. It may cost a good deal of money, and would be cheap at any price. We
want and shall get a million signatures.
Every progressive movement will benefit indirectly by our victory against the long nightmare campaign
of unchecked lies and slander; and certain have already intuitively realised this. All will realise it before
we get through.
Our aim includes no plea for any Theosophical Society. This is the affair of Theosophists, and may be
rather more successful once they have proved to the world that a valiant defence of their unjustly
attacked Founder is really a part of their ethics, as well as being a step to wisdom. Some seem to fancy
that they can skip this step and that it will not move away from under them when they are just getting to
the very top! Their look-out. The rest of us can only stare when they climb up on the Chariot and do
Krishna, for if the Charioteer comes along, they will get a bop off. Arjunas role is in the battle for
justice, not spouting; any shirker can spout, but around him will collect none but those whom HPB called
our Theosophic moles on the path. Happily, there is another sort!
Our battle is for justice to a deeply-wronged woman. That she was also a woman of genius is all to the
good and will help us when the world wakes up to the pleasure of her writings. But the case affects
everyone, and even civil liberties and free expression will gain by the abolition of the lying, slandering or
boycotting tyranny exercised by a thousand apes since the SPR. issued its ukase in 1884, intolerably
dictating its Opinion and offering as ground for that opinion almost nothing but the bare assertions of two
dismissed servants, ready to ruin themselves for revenge, and a Report by one, Hodgson, a member of the
SPR. Hodgsons expenses were privately paid by Professor Sidgwick, thus forestalling the protests of
members and affording the Society in general no right to complain of the misuse of funds in a mere
detective expedition. That Report disgraces honesty and even common decency over and over again,
insulting scores of people and having done incalculable mischief in India. Many attempts have been
13
made to get the SPR. to withdraw it, but on the contrary, the offence has been repeated and aggravated.
Time will bring out the truth.
~ ~ ~
I think I must state that my intention is absolutely not to be drawn into any Theosophical politics.
Whatever questions may interest me later, at present my concern with things Theosophical stops at May
8th, 1891, when HPB passed away. What happened after that has nothing to do with our case.
A fourth, fifth, and perhaps a sixth New Universe will be issued before Vol. 3.
Reviews of Vol. 2 and N.U. are held over to next number. Reviews have come in from The Hindu,
Madras; Light; The Path, Sydney; from H.P.B.s old friend, The Civil & Military Gazette, Lahore;
the Pioneer, Lucknow; the Leader, Allahabad; and several other journals.
Some English journals seem to be boycotting this Defence. Well, two can play at this game when the
other party is rather numerous and not merely one lone Russian.
Readers please send me any reviews they come across, as some editors do not send.
14
FIRST LIST OF VICTIMS OF THE S.P.R.
BESIDES MADAME BLAVATSKY.
The first list is of persons actually named in the Reports, and referred to directly as Confederates or
indirectly as Fools and Dupes, or as being non-existent.
Non-existent: Mahatmas K.H. and M. Ramalinga Deb. R. Gargya Deva. Bhola Deva Sarma.
Confederates: Damodar. Bhavani Shankar. Babajee. Babula. Shankar Singh (suspected). Colonel Olcott
must be included for, in Solovyoffs book, p.116, Walter Leaf states: The committee held, and its
surviving members still hold, that on the evidence which they then had before them it was just possible to
regard Olcott as merely a dupe. The italics are Leafs own, the inference being that since then the SPR
had obtained evidence that Olcott was a confederate. Thus lightly, in those days, a man might be hinted a
criminal, if the hinter were a member of the SPR and the victim a Theosophist! The President of the
United States guaranteed Olcott personally.
Fools and Dupes: Mohini (doubtfully, rather a confederate). J udge Khandalavala, of Poona. A. D.
Ezekiel. Dewan Bahadur Ragoonath Row. Captain Maitland. The Maharajah of Benares (and of course,
his Phantom Highness of Lahore). Major-General Morgan and Mrs. Morgan. Rao Saheb G. Soobhiah
Chetty. Mrs. Colonel Gordon. A. P. Sinnett. Mrs. Sinnett. J udge P. Sreenevas Row. Dr. Hartmann. Mr.
and Mrs. Cooper-Oakley. T. V. Charloo. T. Subba Row. N. Swamy Naidu. J . K. Ghosal. Bertram
Keightley. T. Tatya. Bal. N. Pitale. M. R. G. Sreenivas Row, Registrar of Cumbum. Professor Smith of
Sydney. J udge Gadgill of Baroda. K. M. Shroff. Martandrao B. Nagnath of Bombay. Dorab H. Bharucha.
S. J . Padshah. St. George Lane-Fox. Madame N. Fadeev (HPBs aunt and doubtfully a confederate). Mr.
J acob Sassoon. Ramaswamier Iyer, Registrar of Madura. P. Rathnavelu, editor, Philosophic Inquirer.
Norendra Nath Sen, editor, Indian Mirror. V. Cooppooswamy Iyer, Pleader, Madura. T. C.
Rajamiengar, M.D. G. N. Unwala of Bhaunagar. Pundit Balai Chand Mullik. Nobin K. Bannerjee,
Deputy Magistrate of Berhampore. Pundit Chandra Sekhara of Bareilly.
(To be continued in our next)
NEW UNIVERSE.
A review devoted to the practical defence of Madame Blavatsky, examining charges that may be dealt
with briefly. Not concerned with philosophy. Gives news of the progress of the campaign. As many
subscriptions have been sent in, although the review was announced to be irregular for some months,
general subscriptions will now be accepted. Rates as follows: 12 numbers, 6/6d.; 6 numbers, 3/3d.,
post free. America: 7 numbers, 1 dollar. India: 6 numbers, 2 rupees 4 annas, starting from any number.
Cheques and orders payable to Mrs. Beatrice Hastings, 4 Bedford Row, Worthing, Sussex, England.