368 A Sportswoman in India 



The Zoo in Mysore is worth several visits. They 

 had some rare animals, several fine tigers, and quite 

 the largest panther any of us had ever seen a 

 savage brute which dashed against the iron bars 

 of its cage whenever one went near. Fat and 

 sleek, well fed, the animals were a striking contrast 

 to those in our own Zoo at home, where it is perhaps 

 expensive and difficult to provide great quantities of 

 their natural food, the lack of which, together with 

 the difference in climate, preys upon their health. 



The next day, Sunday, was reserved for seeing 

 Seringapatam. We were up at 5.30 a.m., and after 

 a hurried chota hazri, started at 6 a.m. on a ten-mile 

 drive to one of India's oldest and most interesting cities. 

 The country was well cultivated and wooded, and the 

 River Cauvery, broken by rocks and protecting Seringa- 

 patam, made a memorable picture. Ramanuja, the 

 Vishnuite apostle of 1454, who named it the city of 

 Sri Ranga, or Vishnu, knew what he was about when 

 he selected the little island three miles long and one 

 mile broad, with the wide Cauvery washing round 

 it, and its natural rock walls a practically impregnable 

 position. 



Seringapatam is chiefly famous for the fortress which 

 figured so prominently in Indian history at the close 

 of the eighteenth century. Of its two last Rajahs, 

 Hyder Ali and Tippoo Sultan, Tippoo's name is familiar 

 to all on account of his horrible treatment of English 

 prisoners, his arrogance, despotism, and the slippery 

 character of all his dealings. At the same time, Tippoo 



