near
future. The extension of the frontier into Beloochistan gives Karachi a
strategic importance as the port of arrival of troops and war material
from England. Not less is its importance from a purely commercial view;
for down the Indus Valley Railway to Karachi for shipment, come the
enormous and yearly increasing wheat exportations from the Punjab.

Thus far my precise plans have been held in abeyance until my arrival on
Indian soil. Whether I would find it practicable to start on the wheel
again from Karachi, or whether it would be necessary to proceed to the
northeast, I had not yet been able to find out. At any rate, it is always
best to leave these matters until one gets on the spot.

The result of my investigations at once proves the impossibility, even
were it desirable, of starting from Karachi. The Indus River is at flood,
inundating the country, which is also jungly and wild and without roads.
The heat throughout Scinde in July is something terrific; and to endeavor
to force a way through flooded jungle with a bicycle at such a time would
be little short of madness.

Under these conditions I decide to proceed by rail to Lahore, the capital
of the Punjab, whence, I am told, there will be a good road all the way
to Calcutta. As the crow flies, Lahore is nearer to Furrah than Karachi
is, so that my purpose of making a continuous trail will be better served
from that point anyhow.

It is an interesting jaunt by rail up the Indus Valley; but one's first
impression of India is sure to be one of disappointment by taking this
route. It is a desert country, taken all in all, this historic Scinde;
through which, however, the Indus Valley makes a narrow streak of
agricultural richness.

The cars on the railroad are provided with kus-kus tatties to mollify the
intense heat. They are fixed into the windows so that the passengers may
turn them round from time to time to raise the water from the lower half
to the top, whence it trickles back again and cools the heated air that
percolates through.

The heat increases as we reach Rohri and Sukhar, where passengers are
transferred by ferry across the Indus; the country seems a veritable
furnace, cracking and blistering with heat. At Sukhar our train glides
through some rich date-palms, the origin of which, legend says, were the
date-stones thrown away by the soldiers of Alexander the Great. They seem
to have taken root in congenial soil, anyway, for every tree is heavi