(May — June 1892)
Publications:
- The Path, vol. VII, no. 2, May 1892, pp. 36-39
- no. 3, June 1892, pp. 71-75
Read:
CTD entry in Russian: Джадж У.К. - Жилища Е.П.Б.
DATA
Title for references: Judge WQ - Habitations of H P B
Short description: An illustrated series on H. P. Blavatsky's former residences. No. I describes and pictures No. 17 La...
36 It would not be possible to procure pictures or descriptions of all the houses where H. P. B. lived and worked during her life, but most of those in which she dwelt since 1874 while working for the Theosophical movement are known. Some of these will be given in these articles, not in chronological order but as they come to hand. The first one taken up is that at No. 17 Lansdowne Road, Holland Park, London, to which she moved shortly after coming to England.
The illustration gives the front view on Lansdowne Road. It is made of brick, the first story covered with plaster.37In this street most of the houses are built two together. The window beside the hall door is the window of the dining-room, her own room being back of that and opening on the large garden, or small park, shared in common by all the neighbors. The back room, where she worked during the day and in which the Blavatsky T. S. met on its evenings, looks southward, and sometimes received the rare rays of the sun, who dislikes apparently to shine on London. The picture was taken with an American Kodak camera one morning in 1888 when H. P. B. was working at her desk inside. The grey square space in the window pane is a transparency given to her by a Mr. Wade when she lived in Elgin Crescent. The window on the right of the house is that of her bedroom which opened into her38work-room. Like the front, this part of the house was stuccoed on the first story.
Inside, the dining room in front opened into the work room behind. The front one was seldom used for anything but meals, except when a crowded meeting compelled visitors to sit there. Folding doors divided the rooms from each other. The view of this room is taken from the corner near her desk, and shows the sofa where Mr. Harbottle and others one evening during Lodge session saw plainly the astral form of a Hindu sitting and calmly watching the people. Indeed, so plain was the sight that only when some one sat down into this visitor, causing his disappearance, did Mr. Harbottle exclaim "He wasn't there at all," very excitedly. The picture on the easel is that of an old Eastern friend of H. P. B.'s — of her Master, in fact, as she often said. The little round and ricketty table was used very often in the mornings for holding a frugal breakfast, for H. P. B. was always up and at work very early each day. It was purposely placed in this picture, as it had actually been used just before the view was taken. Such is the magnificence with which the successor of St. Germain was surrounded. During Lodge meetings the president and H. P. B. sat at the garden end of the room, the members occupying seats about. On other evenings the well-known little folding table with a baize cover was brought out, and on that, placed where the round table is in this picture, she beguiled away some hours playing solitaire or whist.
All pictures of Mme. Blavatsky except this and one other were taken at set times, either in the shop of the photographer or at Conventions and other meetings. But none were obtained of her as she paused in her work until in 1880 this little photograph seized her, after consent, just as she was beginning the day's work on Lucifer, then in its babyhood. She had only a short while before come out from the room behind her and sat down at the desk on which the first pages of Lucifer were begun and whereon most, if not all, of the Secret Doctrine was written. The pen in her hand is an American gold pen given to her by a New York Theosophist and made by John Foley whose name is known to thousands of writers. The sheet of paper in front is a sheet of the MSS. of Secret Doctrine, and others lie about. The old wrapper she wears was more comfortable than gowns of state, to which she did not incline though they were prettier. The famous Matara tobacco basket is just beyond her hand, and on the bracket against the wall is a little white marble elephant — emblem of power and wisdom — given her by a friend. All about are photographs of admirers and disciples39from every part of the world. She delighted in pictures of her friends, and always had them near, on the walls, on brackets, covering door-panels, everywhere in fact. This was an old habit.
In the early days of 1874-75 pictures were always crowding each other, and many of them she ingeniously framed and hung up herself.
Out of this house she seldom went. Here day after day and night after night for some years her every hour was open to the gaze of all men. Yet detractors never ceased their spiteful flings, but she worked on ceaselessly in those rooms, at that desk, editing, corresponding, transcribing the Secret Doctrine, leaving a treasury of information and suggestion for those who care to look beneath the surface and are not wholly carried away by the rush and bluster of a transitory civilization.
Three years and a half after this picture was taken, the tenement of clay so well used by H. P. B. for sixty years was abandoned by her and cremated at Woking.
The Witness.
71
In the Path of 1890 (vol. v, April) a view was given of the Headquarters building at Adyar as it appeared after alteration and the addition of the library wing. It need not be repeated here, as H. P. B. did not reside in it subsequent to the alterations, but was residing in London. The changes consisted in filling in the spaces at each side of the porte cochère, thus turning the latter into an entrance, and adding rooms at each end of the building in front. Col. Olcott also constructed an additional building, on the ocean side, for the Oriental Library. Some changes were made in the roof by the raising of the top of what was called the "occult room", which had a sloping roof when H. P. B. lived there, as the illustration on next page will show.
72 This picture is reproduced from an accurate sketch made on the spot in 1884, the point of view being as you come up the drive from the entrance gate.[1] It shows the front of the building as it faces the compound, and runs down to where the library building now stands. The porte cochère spoken of above is seen in perspective. It gave a grand air to the front, but has been absorbed by the alterations. The whole building was, in 1884, of a white color, appearing at a distance like a marble structure, but in reality is constructed of brick plastered white, as is very usual in India. It was purchased some years ago by subscription, and is now free of debt. Standing in a compound — or grounds — of some 21 acres, it is a very fine place, and if its counterpart were found in this country the cost would be very large, whereas in India its value is small by comparison with American properties. The Adyar River flows along behind the house not more than ten feet away. It is not a river of any consequence, its mouth being generally closed with sand through which the stream percolates into the ocean; and at this season of the year the water is very low and the odor from the mud rather disagreeable, but at full seasons it is a delightful little creek, as we would call it.
Just appearing over the ornamental balustrade which encloses the roof is the front of H. P. B.'s own room, which led into the73shrine-room shown in the second picture. Her room was an addition to the building, and in a way served to join the two towers which rise at the back corners at either end. The stairs of the tower illustrated was the means of communication with her apartment, although the other tower had also a stairway, and another stairs was made running directly into the lower rooms at the library end. But these were not completed in June, 1884, when she was in Europe, as Monsieur Coulomb suspended work as soon as Mme. Blavatsky and Col. Olcott had gone to London, and began at once to construct the ex post facto trap-doors which he hoped to ruin the Society with, and at the same time to turn over some honest pennies of the missionaries for his so-called exposé.
That part of the compound extending from the entrance gate on the highway was full of mango trees, and through them the driveway brought you up to the house and under the porte cochère. Alighting there, a short flight of steps took you up to the entrance hall, where the floor was of black and white marble. Here there were two tables, sofas, and some chairs, and on the floor many a night slept Damodar K. Mavalankar, of pleasant memory, together with several others, including Ananda and Babajee.
Part of the end of the building on the side near the main road is given here. It is a continuation of the corner seen in the first cut. The tower finishes the river end of the building, and the river itself can be just seen at the back. On the top is the occult74room with the extension or verandah. The roof of the "occult room" was slanting and tiled in red, the plaster being tinted yellow. In this was the shrine. It was entered from the other side, and, being a few feet lower than the rooms used by H. P. B., a short flight of steps ran down into it. In the tower is a winding brick stairway, and opening on that was one window of the occult room. This window was made into a cupboard, the back of which looked on the stairs. This back was altered by M. Coulomb after H. P. B.'s departure so as to have a sliding panel as a part of his conspiracy. It was not workable, however. The whole upper part of the house was, in fact, a patchwork devoid of regularity.
Damodar's room was in this tower at the top as you came up the narrow stairs. It was from that little room the famous "shrine" was stolen on the night after its removal from the wall in the "occult room". A corridor, as you might call it, ran across the back of H. P. B.'s rooms from tower to tower, open to the river and giving a view of the little island opposite and the long queer bridge which carries the highway across the river. The small picture shows this bridge, which was painted pink.
Opposite beyond the bridge can be seen among the trees other large houses, as the vicinity was once in great demand before the trade of Madras declined. Every evening at sunset large flying foxes would rise up in great numbers from the direction of the city and fly over to Adyar to feed during the night on the mango and other fruit-trees in the vicinity. Many of them stopped on the Headquarters grounds.
This is reproduced from a photograph of the back of the building taken from the little island at the right of the bridge picture. It shows the other tower, companion to that in which was Damodar's room. The lower floor under the roof was the back part of the middle of the building, and was occupied by the Theosophist magazine. Trees and shrubs almost hid the view. A plastered embankment ran for a short distance along this side so as to protect the foundations.
75 These pictures give a very correct idea of the house when H. P. B. lived in it, but all has now been changed by the addition of the Library and by various changes in the roof which Col. Olcott put into effect after the desecration of the place by the Coulombs, so that now the old "occult room" is a thing of the past, not to be revived until another great personage such as H. P. B. was shall have come and been revealed to us.
The Witness.
Footnotes
- ↑ The illustrations to these articles are all by William Q. Judge except the process plate in No. I.