anything from
being handled. Money has to be placed where the Brahman can pick it up
without incurring the awful danger of personal contact with an unhallowed
kaffir.

The fifty miles, that from the splendid condition of the roads I have
thought little enough for the average day's run, is duly reeled off as I
ride into the splendid civil lines and cantonment of Um-balla at dusk.
But my few days' experience on the roads of India have sufficed to
convince me that fifty miles is entirely beyond the bounds of discretion.
It is, in fact, beyond the bounds of discretion to be riding any distance
in the present season here; fifty miles is overcome to-day only by the
exercise of almost superhuman will-power.

The average native, when asked for the dak bungalow, is quite as likely
to direct one to the post-office, the kutcherry, or any other government
building, from a seeming inability to discriminate between them. At the
entrance to Umballa one of these hopeful participants in the blessings of
enlightened government informs me, with sundry obsequious salaams, that
the dak bungalow is four miles farther. So thoroughly has my fifty-mile
ride used up my energy that even this four miles, on a most perfect road,
seems utterly impossible of accomplishment; besides which, experience has
taught that following the directions given would very likely bring me to
the post-office and farther away from the dak bungalow than ever.

Above the trees, not far away, is observed the weathercock of a
chapel-spire, plainly indicating the location of the European quarter.
Taking a branch road leading in that direction, I discover a party of
English and native gentlemen playing a game of lawn-tennis. Arriving on
the scene just as the game is breaking up, I am cordially invited to
"come in and take a peg." To the uninitiated a "peg" is a rather
ambiguous term, but to the Anglo-Indian its interpretation takes the
seductive form of a big tumbler of brandy and soda, a "long drink," than
which nothing could be more acceptable in my present fagged-out
condition. No hesitation is therefore made in accepting; and, under the
stimulating influence of the generous brandy and soda, exhausted nature
is quickly recuperated. While not an advocate of indiscriminate
indulgence in alcoholic stimulants, after an enervating ride through the
wilting heat of an Indian day I am convinced that nothing is more
beneficial than what Anglo-Indians laconically describe as a "