To
His Father-in-Law [1]1Sri Aurobindo
Letters of Sri Aurobindo
Letters
Fragment ID: 6355
(this fragment is largest or earliest found passage)
Sri Aurobindo — Bose, Bhupal Chandra (Sri Aurobindo’s father-in-law)
June 8, 1906
To
His Father-in-Law [1]1
Calcutta
June 8th 1906.
My dear father-in-law,
I could not come over to Shillong in May, because my stay in Eastern Bengal was unexpectedly long. It was nearly the end of May before I could return to Calcutta, so that my programme was necessarily changed. I return to Baroda today. I have asked for leave from the 12th, but I do not know whether it will be sanctioned so soon. In any case I shall be back by the end of the month. If you are anxious to send Mrinalini down, I have no objection whatever. I have no doubt my aunt will gladly put her up until I can return from Baroda and make my arrangements.
I am afraid I shall never be good for much in the way of domestic virtues. I have tried, very ineffectively, to do some part of my duty as a son, a brother and a husband, but there is something too strong in me which forces me to subordinate everything else to it. Of course that is no excuse for my culpability in not writing letters,– a fault I am afraid I shall always be quicker to admit than to reform. I can easily understand that to others it may seem to spring from a lack of the most ordinary affection. It was not so in the case of my father from whom I seem to inherit the defect. In all my fourteen years in England I hardly got a dozen letters from him, and yet I cannot doubt his affection for me, since it was the false report of my death which killed him. I fear you must take me as I am with all my imperfections on my head.
Barin has again fallen ill, and I have asked him to go
out to some healthier place for a short visit. I was thinking he might go to
Waltair, but he has set his heart on going to Shillong – I don’t quite know why,
unless it is to see a quite new place and at the same time make acquaintance
with his sister-in-law’s family. If he goes, I am sure you will take good care
of him for the short time he may be there. You will find him, I am afraid,
rather wilful and erratic,– the family failing. He is especially fond of 
knocking about by himself in a spasmodic and irregular fashion when he ought to
be sitting at home and nursing his delicate health, but I have learnt not to
interfere with him in this respect; if checked, he is likely to go off at a
tangent and makes things worse. He has, however, an immense amount of vitality
which allows him to play these tricks with impunity in a good climate, and I
think a short stay at Shillong ought to give him another lease of health.
Your affectionate son-in-law
Aurobindo Ghose
1 June 1906. Sri Aurobindo wrote this letter to his father-in-law Bhupal Chandra Bose (1861–1937) towards the beginning of his active political career.