“S IR, WHITHER are we bound this morning?” Mr. Wright was driving the Ford; he took his eyes off the road long enough to gaze at me with a questioning twinkle. From day to day he seldom knew what part of Bengal he would be discovering next.

“God willing,” I replied devoutly, “we are on our way to see an eighth wonder of the world—a woman saint whose diet is thin air!”

“Repetition of wonders—after Therese Neumann.” But Mr. Wright laughed eagerly just the same; he even accelerated the speed of the car. More extraordinary grist for his travel diary! Not one of an average tourist, that!

The Ranchi school had just been left behind us; we had risen before the sun. Besides my secretary and myself, three Bengali friends were in the party. We drank in the exhilarating air, the natural wine of the morning. Our driver guided the car warily among the early peasants and the two-wheeled carts, slowly drawn by yoked, hump-shouldered bullocks, inclined to dispute the road with a honking interloper.

“Sir, we would like to know more of the fasting saint.”

“Her name is Giri Bala,” I informed my companions. “I first heard about her years ago from a scholarly gentleman, Sthiti Lal Nundy. He often came to the Gurpar Road home to tutor my brother Bishnu.”

“‘I know Giri Bala well,’ Sthiti Babu told me. ‘She employs a certain yoga technique which enables her to live without eating. I was her close neighbor in Nawabganj near Ichapur. I made it a point to watch her closely; never did I find evidence that she was taking either food or drink. My interest finally mounted so high that I approached the Maharaja of Burdwan and asked him to conduct an investigation. Astounded at the story, he invited her to his palace. She agreed to a test and lived for two months locked up in a small section of his home. Later she returned for a palace visit of twenty days; and then for a third test of fifteen days. The Maharaja himself told me that these three rigorous scrutinies had convinced him beyond doubt of her non-eating state.’

“This story of Sthiti Babu’s has remained in my mind for over twenty-five years,” I concluded. “Sometimes in America I wondered if the river of time would not swallow the yogini before I could meet her. She must be quite aged now. I do not even know where, or if, she lives. But in a few hours we shall reach Purulia; her brother has a home there.”

By ten-thirty our little group was conversing with the brother, Lambadar Dey, a lawyer of Purulia.

“Yes, my sister is living. She sometimes stays with me here, but at present she is at our family home in Biur.” Lambadar Babu glanced doubtfully at the Ford. “I hardly think, Swamiji, that any automobile has ever penetrated into the interior as far as Biur. It might be best if you all resign yourselves to the ancient jolt of the bullock cart!”

As one voice our party pledged loyalty to the Pride of Detroit.

“The Ford comes from America,” I told the lawyer. “It would be a shame to deprive it of an opportunity to get acquainted with the heart of Bengal!”

“May Ganesh go with you!” Lambadar Babu said, laughing. He added courteously, “If you ever get there, I am sure Giri Bala will be glad to see you. She is approaching her seventies, but continues in excellent health.”

“Please tell me, sir, if it is absolutely true that she eats nothing?” I looked directly into his eyes, those telltale windows of the mind.

GIRI BALA

This great woman yogi has not taken food or drink since 1880. I am pictured with her, in 1936, at her home in the isolated Bengal village of Biur. Her non-eating state has been rigorously investigated by the Maharaja of Burdwan. She employs a certain yoga technique to recharge her body with cosmic energy from the ether, sun, and air.

“It is true.” His gaze was open and honorable. “In more than five decades I have never seen her eat a morsel. If the world suddenly came to an end, I could not be more astonished than by the sight of my sister’s taking food!”

We chuckled together over the improbability of these two cosmic events.

“Giri Bala has never sought an inaccessible solitude for her yoga practices,” Lambadar Babu went on. “She has lived her entire life surrounded by her family and friends. They are all well accustomed now to her strange state. Not one of them who would not be stupefied if Giri Bala suddenly decided to eat anything! Sister is naturally retiring, as befits a Hindu widow, but our little circle in Purulia and in Biur all know that she is literally an ‘exceptional’ woman.”

The brother’s sincerity was manifest. Our little party thanked him warmly and set out toward Biur. We stopped at a street shop for curry and luchis, attracting a swarm of urchins who gathered round to watch Mr. Wright eating with his fingers in the simple Hindu manner. Hearty appetites caused us to fortify ourselves against an afternoon which, unknown at the moment, was to prove fairly laborious.

Our way now led east through sun-baked rice fields into the Burdwan section of Bengal. On through roads lined with dense vegetation; the songs of the maynas and the stripethroated bulbuls streamed out from trees with huge, umbrellalike branches. A bullock cart now and then, the rini, rini, manju, manju squeak of its axle and iron-shod wooden wheels contrasting sharply in mind with the swish, swish of auto tires over the aristocratic asphalt of the cities.

“Dick, halt!” My sudden request brought a jolting protest from the Ford. “That overburdened mango tree is fairly shouting an invitation!”

The five of us dashed like children to the mango-strewn earth; the tree had benevolently shed its fruits as they had ripened.

“Full many a