bracelets and a redbordered cloth. So long as Golap-Ma was there she shielded her from their uncharitable remarks, but after she left the place, the scandal-mongers got busy again. To her great relief Prasannamayi, the aged sister of the Lahas of Kamarpukur and an intimate friend of Sri Ramakrishna's boyhood days, now came to her rescue. She silenced the critics partly by declaring, 'The wife of Gadai
2 is a veritable goddess. She is not an ordinary type of woman.'
The Holy Mother herself now decided to disarm all criticism by removing the bracelets from her wrists, but she was prevented from doing so by a vision she had of the Master. To describe it in her own words, 'While staying at Kamarpukur after my return from Brindavan, I took off my bracelets for fear of public criticism. In fact people were already talking about it I also wished to go for bath in the Ganges, for which I have always had a special devotion. But the river is far away from Kamarpukur. Now one day I saw, to my great surprise, that the Master was coming towards the house from the direction of Bhuti's canal. He was followed by Naren, Baburam, Rakhal and many other devotees. Further I saw that from his feet sprang a stream of water which flowed in front of him in waves. I said to myself, 'I see he is everything. The Ganges has sprung from his lotus feet.' Quickly I plucked flowers from the side of the Raghuvir temple and offered handfuls of them into the stream. The Master then said to me, 'don't take off the bracelets. Do you know the Vaishnava Tantras?' I said, 'what are they? I do not know anything about them.'
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2 The pet name (the shortened form of 'Gadadhar') by which Sri Ramakrishna was known in his boyhood.