मेरा आजीवन कारावास / माझी जन्मठेप (स्वातंत्र्यवीर सावरकर - काले पानी का ऐतिहासिक संस्मरण)

'What a piece of good luck it has proved to be!" To which I would reply, "Well then, it was right, after all, that I was sentenced to transportation for life. You, at least, welcome it, it seems." Day and night I used to enter into conversation with them And the one thing I treed to impress upon them was that they should even thank of their country. And It was their duty to work for its freedom, and so on and so forth. When any one spoke to me, full of passion and sincerity, that it grieved his heart to find me in this pitiable condition, my answer to him always was, "Then you must be ready to fight. India must be fully armed to fight and wm her freedom, whatever be the cost of that struggle, whatever the ordeal she has to pass through to reach the goal. Then not only I but ship after ship laden with her cargo of prisoners shall be crossing the seas to go to the Andamans. You should realise this beforehand, for whoever reaps has to sow, and whoever sows has to reap " From the ordinary sailor to the highest Officer of the ship, from the prisoner right up to the soldier I had become an instrument of political discussion all round. Some of them heard things that they had never heard before What had never suggested Itself to them upto that time did suggest Itself to them now And convection came to them on matters of which they were never convinced previously. Barrie Baba Another Important matter which harassed my mind during the voyage and did not give it rest, was to know the kind of treatment meted out to the prisoners during their term of imprisonment in the Andamans That was the one question I put to everyone whom I met on the boat, the one question I pursued all along the route. The party of soldiers accompanying the prisoners was one prime source of that information. They were, as it were, the archpriests of that temple, and its authorized version. Whenever one uttered the name-transportation for life --the first response that came from that quarter was the word-Barrie Baba. The one happened to be the synonym for the other. When even the worst of the prisoners showed the slightest spirit of rowdyism or indulged in noisy mutual recrimination, the soldiers rebuked them with the exclamation, "Wait, you seem to be too proud of your devilry But remember that once you face Berrie Baba all this will at once disappear. You will shake and shiver before him like aspen leaves." As I felt that this mysterious personage and myself were soon to be life- long Intimates, I was curious to know who and what Barrie Baba was But I decided that it was no use questioning the sepoys about him. About the Andamans, they assured me that, within six months of my stay in that place, I would get my release from hard labour in the prison- house, and be detailed for some work in the office Itself An Intelligent and educated man like me, they further added, might even be put in charge of a whole district in that place, had a good chance there, during ten years, to make his pile, have a home for himself and to pass the rest of his life in happiness and peace. That was their constant refrain as they talked to me on that subject Am I being taken to the Andamans, I asked myself, to be rewarded for my revolutionary activities in India? It was well then that I was caught at Marseilles ! If life in the Andamans is as they depict it, it will not be harder than the days