Prince of Gentlemen in the Orange Garb

I wish to move out of Chicago and travel with Swamiji to the midwest but as i read and re-read i come across certtain facts which hold my attention and does not allow me to move further.

Some of the Newspaper reports and a memoir is a must to read......

Northampton Daily Herald of 11th April, 1894 -

                     "At the Parliament of Religions Vivekananda was not allowed to speak until the close of the programme, the purpose being to make the people stay until the end of the session. On a warm day when some prosy professor talked too long, and people would leave the hall by hundreds, it only needed the announcement that Vivekananda would give a short address before the benediction was pronounced to hold the vast audience intact, and thousands would wait for hours to hear a fifteen minutes talk from this remarkable man."

Just His appearance on the platform would save a dull session. The talks given by Dwivedi and Dharmapala wwere also hair-raising but were dry & not at all to ignite the soul hence were not alarming to the Christian ministry. But the enthusiastic reception which Swamiji was given from the very beginning was a matter of serious concern. This instigated the Christain delegates to attack Hinduism openly on September 19th when Swamiji was to read his paper.

On September 20th, the Chicago Inter Ocean tells us -

                  "Great crowds of people, the most of whom werre women, pressed around the doors leading to the hall of Columbus, an hour before the time stated for opening the afterrnoon session, for it had been announced that Swami Vivekananda, the popular Hindu Monk, who looks so much like McCullough's Othello, was to speak. Ladies, ladies everywhere filled the great auditorium."

There are similar quotes by othe newspapers saying -

                  'From the day the wonderful Professor delivered his speech, which was followed by other addresses, he was followed by a crowd wherever he went. In going in and coming out of tyhe building, he was beset by hundreds of women who almost fought with each other for a chance to get near him, and shake his hand.'

But it was not only women who were responsive to Swamiji's thought and presence. Among many men who remembered His paper on Hinduism was William Ernest Hocking a young student who later beame a well known philosopher. He wrote about his experience a few years later in his "Recollections of Swami Vivekananda".

What he wrote cannot be cut short hence i shall tell tomorrow because it is so so very inspiring.