Letters from Sri Ramanasramam, by Suri Nagamma

I used to help her in cooking by going to her place and
cutting the vegetables. She had great confidence in me. She
used to go to town daily, obtain rice, flour, dhal and the like
by begging at various houses and store them in a big open-
mouthed earthen jar. Once in a way she used to prepare
gruel with that flour and dhal and bring it with the vegetable
curry, saying, ‘Sami, Sami, yesterday one good lady gave me
a little flour. I have made some gruel, Sami.’ She believed
that I knew nothing. When she was not there, I used to
open the doors of that Mandap and find several varieties of
foodstuffs in the jar. But then she had absolute confidence
in me. She did not allow anyone else into that Mandap. When
she could not find any vegetables she used to sit there
depressed. On such occasions I used to climb the tamarind
tree, pluck some tender leaves and give them to her. She
was thus somehow supplying me food every day. She never
used to take anything herself. She used to bring all sorts of
curries, saying, ‘Sami likes that.’ She had great devotion and
attention. Even at eighty years of age she used to wander
about all over the hill. She was living there on the hill even
before I went there.”
“Was she not afraid of anything?” I asked.

Bhagavan said, “No. What had she to be afraid of? You
know what happened one day? I went to the Skandasramam
and stayed there for the night. Palaniswami was in the
Virupaksha Cave. At midnight a thief got into her place and
was trying to get away with things, when she woke up and
cried out, ‘Who is that?’ The thief put his hand over her
mouth but she somehow managed to shout at the top of her
voice, ‘Oh, Annamalai! Thief! Thief!’ Her cries could be heard
even at Skandasramam where I was. I shouted back saying,
‘Here I am! I am coming. Who is that?’ So saying I ran down
in hot haste. On the way, at the Virupaksha Cave, I asked
Palaniswami about it and he said, ‘I heard some shouting
from the cave of the old woman, but I thought she was
mumbling something.’ Some people were living at the Mango
Cave and the Jataswami Cave but no one appears to have
heard her cries.

“The cries were heard by the one that had to hear them
and Arunachala himself responded to her call,” I said.

Nodding his head in assent, Bhagavan said, “Hearing my
shouting, the thief ran away. We both went to her, asked her
where the thief was and as there was no one, we laughed
away saying it was all imagination. She said, ‘No Sami. When
he was removing things I challenged him and so he put his
hands over my mouth to prevent me from shouting.

I somehow managed to shout at the top of my voice. It was
perhaps you that said you were coming. He heard that and
ran away.’ There was no light there and so we lighted a piece
of firewood and searched the whole place when we found
the jar and around it several small odds and ends scattered
about, we then realised that it was a fact.”
I said, “Her belief in God was profound. Hers is not an
ordinary birth, but a birth with a purpose.” Bhagavan merely
nodded his head and was silent.

When Gajendra sent out his appeal to Lord Vishnu the
latter heard it in Vaikunta and immediately rushed to relieve
the distress of Gajendra without telling Lakshmi and without
bearing his arms, viz., Conch and the Disc. In the same
manner Bhagavan ran to the rescue of his devotee. See the
solicitude towards devotees!