Page 7 - All India Magazine Sep-2021

see if they could get out. While the horses were helpless,
a donkey got out by lifting idle latch and opening the
gate.
Why go so far? Even in our Ashram the Mother's cat
Chikoo was extraordinarily clever. One day she was con-
fined in a room. It was discovered that she was trying
to open the window in exactly same way as the Mother
used to do. Evidently Chikoo had watched the Mother
carefully.
We had a dog, a bitch left by somebody in the first
house we rented. One day she was locked out. Finding it
impossible to push the door open, she just sat in front of
it and began to think, "How to get in?" The way she sat
and the attitude of her head and eyes showed clearly that
she was thinking. Then suddenly she got up, as saying
to herself, "Ah, there is the bathroom door. Let me try it.
And she went in that direction. The door was open and
she got in.
It is the Europeans who make a big difference between
man and animal. The only difference is that animals can't
form concepts and can't read or write or philosophise.
N: They can't do Yoga, either.
Sri Aurobindo : I don't know about that. Once, while the
Mother and I were meditating, a cat happened to be pres-
ent. We found that she was behaving oddly. She passed
into a trance and was almost on the point of leaving her
body and dying, when suddenly she recovered. Evidently
she was trying to receive something.
Talks with Sri Aurobindo, pp. 223-224

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