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LETTERS FROM ABROAD

I have often felt the desire that you were with me in my adventure. And yet I am deeply thankful that you could remain in the Ashram while I was away. For you understand me with the understanding of love, and, therefore, through you I seem to dwell in Santiniketan. I know that I am in your mind to-day and you know that my Heart is with you. Is it not a great good fortune that there is a spot in this world, where all that is best in us can meet in truth and love? Can anything be greater than that? Please give my blessings to all my boys and girls, and my greetings of love to my friends.

NEAR New YORK, December 25, 1920.

To-day is Christmas Day, We are about forty-five guests gathered in this inn from different parts of the United States. It is a beautiful house, nestling in the heart of a wooded hill, with an invitation floating in the air of a brook broadening into a lake in the valley. It is a glorious morning, full of peace and sunlight, of the silence of the leafless forest untouched by bird songs or humming of bees.

But where is the spirit of Christmas in human hearts? The men and women are feeding themselves with extra dishes and laughing extra loud. But there is not the least touch of the eternal in the heart of their merriment, no luminous serenity of joy, no depth of devotion. How