82 MADRAS, PONDICHERRY, TRAVANCORE 



One of the features along the railway-line is 

 the Chilka Lake, a vast sheet of brackish water 

 full, I understand, of fish. 



I had hoped to travel down to Madras in fair 

 comfort in my saloon, but as usual I came in for 

 a break in the line owing to abnormally heavy 

 and late rains. Equally, as usual, I was assured 

 that both the weather and the break were most 

 exceptional. The whole of Friday afternoon it 

 poured incessantly, a regular monsoon downpour, 

 and we gradually got into country which was 

 practically under water. The only merit in the 

 weather was that it cured my prickly heat. 



The ryots in Madras use huge straw umbrellas, 

 which seem to do equally well for sun and rain; 

 at any rate, they all seemed perfectly happy and 

 fairly dry. In the neighbourhood of Waltair the 

 farms and farm steadings might have been 

 English, so well built and so well kept did they 

 seem to be. 



At Waltair Junction I got news that the line 

 was washed away some seventy miles north of 

 Madras, and I found myself having to face two 

 deviations and two changes. Seeing that the 

 relief line was built on water-level, it is not 

 surprising that the deviations had been washed 

 away as soon as they were made. I found myself 

 obliged to go a long way round, which involved 

 two changes and a special train. The serious 

 part of it was that I had to unpack in my saloon 

 in a hurry, leave half my things behind, and 

 travel with an irreducible minimum of goods and 

 chattels, clothes and bedding, which in India 

 generally spells a catastrophe. I went through 



