About the time of my marriage, little pamphlets costing a pice, or a pie (I
now forget how much), used to be issued, in which conjugal love, thrift,
child marriages, and other such subjects were discussed. Whenever I came
across any of these, I used to go through them cover to cover, and it
was a habit with me to forget what I did not like, and to carry out in
practice whatever I liked. Lifelong faithfulness to the wife, inculcated
in these booklets as the duty of the husband, remained permanently
imprinted on my heart. Furthermore, the passion for truth was innate in
me, and to be false to her was therefore out of the question. And then
there was very little chance of my being faithless at that tender age.
But the lesson of faithfulness had also an untoward effect. 'If I should be
pledged to be faithful to my wife, she also should be pledged to be
faithful to me', I said to myself. The thought made me a jealous
husband. Her duty was easily converted into my right to exact
faithfulness from her, and if it had to be exacted, I should be
watchfully tenacious of the right. I had absolutely no reason to suspect
my wife's fidelity, but jealousy does not wait for reasons. I must needs
be for ever on the look-out regarding her movements, and therefore she
could not go anywhere without my permission. This sowed the seeds of a
bitter quarrel between us. The restraint was virtually a sort of
imprisonment. And Kasturbai was not the girl to brook any such thing.
She made it a point to go out whenever and wherever she liked. More
restraint on my part resulted in more liberty being taken by her, and in
my getting more and more cross. Refusal to speak to one another thus
became the order of the day with us, married children. I think it was
quite innocent of Kasturbai to have taken those liberties with my
restrictions. How could a guileless girl brook any restraint on going to
the temple or on going on visits to friends? If I had the right to
impose restrictions on her, had not she also similar right? All this is
clear to me today. But at that time I had to make good my authority as a
husband!
Let not the reader think, however, that ours was a life of unrelieved bitterness.
For my severities were all based on love. I wanted to make my wife an
ideal wife. My ambition was to make her live a
pure life, learn what I learnt, and identify her life and thought with
mine.
I do not know whether Kasturbai had any such ambition. She was illiterate. By nature
she was simple, independent, persevering and, with me at least,
reticent. She was not impatient of her ignorance and I do not recollect
my studies having ever spurred her to go in for a similar adventure. I
fancy, therefore, that my ambition was all one-sided. My passion was
entirely centred on one woman, and I wanted it to be reciprocated. But
even if there were no reciprocity, it could not be all unrelieved misery
because there was active love on one side at least.
I must say I was passionately fond of her. Even at school I used to think of her, and
the thought of nightfall and our subsequent meeting was ever haunting
me. Separation was unbearable. I used to keep her awake till late in the
night with my idle talk. If with this devouring passion there had not
been in me a burning attachment to duty, I should either have fallen a
prey to disease and premature death, or have sunk into a burdensome
existence. But the appointed tasks had to be gone through every morning,
and lying to anyone was out of the question. It was this last thing that
saved me from many a pitfall.
I have already said that Kasturbai was illiterate. I was very anxious to teach
her, but lustful love left me no time. For one thing the teaching had to
be done against her will, and that too at night. I dared not meet her in
the presence of the elders, much less talk to her. Kathiawad had then,
and to a certain extent has even today, its own peculiar, useless and
barbarous Purdah.Circumstances were thus unfavourable. I must therefore confess that most
of my efforts to instruct Kasturbai in our youth were unsuccessful. And
when I awoke from the sleep of lust, I had already launched forth into
public life, which did not leave me much spare time. I failed likewise
to instruct her through private tutors. As a result Kasturbai can now
with difficulty write simple letters and understand simple Gujarati. I
am sure that, had my love for her been absolutely untainted with lust,
she would be a learned lady today; for I could than have conquered her
dislike for studies. I know that nothing is impossible for pure love.
I have mentioned one circumstance that more or less saved me from the disasters
of lustful love. There is another worth noting. Numerous examples have
convinced me that God ultimately saves him whose motive is pure. Along
with the cruel custom of child marriages, Hindu society has another
custom which to a certain extent diminishes the evils of the former.
Parents do not allow young couples to stay long together. The child-wife
spends more than half her time at her father's place. Such was the case
with us. That is to say, during the first five years of our married life
(from the age of 13 to 18), we could not have lived together longer than
an aggregate period of three years. We would hardly have spent six
months together, when there would be a call to my wife from her parents.
Such calls were very unwelcome in those days, but they saved us both. At
the age of eighteen I went to England, and this meant a long and healthy
spell of separation. Even after my return from England we hardly stayed
together longer than six months. For I had to run up and down between
Rajkot and Bombay. Then came the call from South Africa, and that found
me already fairly free from the carnal appetite.