1889-90.] A Journey from Bombay to Jeypore. 315 



windows of the Sidi Syed mosque, or its wonderful tombs 

 and other Mohammedan buildings, would only be a weariness 

 to the flesh, so I won't trouble you. Try and think you are 

 with us in the train, which goes jolting along at from fifteen to 

 twenty-five miles an hour. It is daybreak, and we can see 

 we are approaching a range of mountains. On each side of 

 the railway is a great plain, arid and uninviting, with dense 

 clumps of the high jungle-grass in which wild beasts find a 

 hiding-place. Now and again we pass a few trees with great 

 numbers of monkeys chattering in them, and quite fearless. 

 Who dare touch them ? — for we are now in Eajputana, where 

 the lives of most animals are held sacred. We are entering 

 a broad valley, with the Arvalli hills to the east, and the 

 high, rugged, forest-clad spurs of Mount Abu to the north- 

 west. At 7.40 A.M. we arrived at Abu Eoad station, where 

 there is a refreshment-room to which we had telegraphed to 

 have breakfast ready for us, and also ponies, as we had re- 

 solved to attempt an expedition to Mount Abu and the cele- 

 brated Jain temples at Delwada or Devalwada. Dusty travel- 

 lers we truly were when we reached Abu Eoad, and you can 

 hardly understand the intense enjoyment of a bath under 

 such circumstances. We were therefore overjoyed to find that 

 there were bath-rooms at the station, and we soon were en- 

 joying the luxury, and forgot the fatigues of two nights' travel 

 in the train. We had a comfortable breakfast, made inquiries 

 about the track we were to follow, and found we were likely 

 to have a much more arduous journey than we had supposed. 

 The distance through the jungle and over the mountain to the 

 temples by the rough path is a little over twenty miles by the 

 route we took ; and as our time compelled us to do the double 

 journey in one day, it was rather plucky of the ladies to 

 attemj)t it. 



Breakfast over, we found the ponies were waiting, and we 

 mounted. Besides the two ladies, myself, and our native 

 courier, who was also mounted on a pony, we had a wild- 

 looking Gujarati syce, who was also to act as guide. He was 

 not troubled with much clothing, which was fortunate, as, 

 poor fellow, he had to run the whole distance of over forty 

 miles. His remuneration, no doubt, he considered very hand- 

 some, as the tariff fixed by Government enabled him to earn 



