There is even a small cycle club in quasi existence at Allahabad; but it
is afflicted with chronic lassitude, as a result of the enervating
climate of the Indian plains. Young men who bring with them from England
all the Englishman's love of athletics soon become averse to exercise,
and prefer a quiet "peg" beneath the punkah to wheeling or cricket.
During the brief respite from the hades-like temperature afforded by
December and January, they sometimes take club runs down the Ganges and
indulge in the pastime of shooting at alligators with small-bore rifles.
The walks in the beautiful public gardens and every other place about
Allahabad are free to wheelmen, and afford most excellent riding.
Messrs. Wingrave and Gawke, the two most enterprising wheelmen, turn out
at 6 a.m. to escort me four miles to the Ganges ferry. Some idea of the
trying nature of the climate in August may be gathered from the fact that
one of my companions arrives at the river fairly exhausted, and is
compelled to seek the assistance of a native gharri to get back home. The
exposure and exercise I am taking daily is positively dangerous, I am
everywhere told, but thus far I have managed to keep free from actual
sickness.
The sacred river is at its highest flood, and hereabout not less than a
mile and half wide.
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