Page:Who's Who in India Supplement 2 (1914).djvu/223

SUPPLEMENT 143 interest in the tales of the Hindu heroes of old and evinced an overpowering love for athletics. He would run and romp and go through the exercises prescribed by native wrestlers and when he became a little older he took to foreign gymnastics with the same avidity as he had shown for those of his own land. In 1896, Prof. Rammurti joined the High School at Vizianagram as an Honorary teacher of physical culture and the position afforded him ample opportunity to engage in manly sports and develope his physique. About 3 years later, he discovered that his foreign exercises — his practice with trapeziums, rings, parallel bars, horizontal bars and Sandow's dumb-bells — were doing him no good. They produced an abnormal muscular development but no strength. Moreover, they called for expensive apparatus. Once his mind w^as made up he exclusively took to Indian gymnastics — dand^ baithak, w^alking in the morning and running, swimming, wrestling, etc. In 1902, the youngman joined the "Raja of Tuni Circus Company and was made the manager of the concern. His athletic feats interested the public and in 1903 and 1904, he was the recipient of a number of medals. In 1904, the company broke and Rammurti was again unengaged. On 27th May, 1905, he challenged Eugen Sandow who was, at the time, charming Madras with his dumb-bell feats. Sandow rejected the challenge refusing to put his strength against that of a mere " native " but this did not discourage Rammurti. On the other hand, he himself began to think of large audiences witnessing and applauding his own performances like those of the English physical culturist. In 1905, he gave his first exhibition in Madras under the patronage of Lord Ampthill, the then Governor of the Presidency. His feats won him instant success, for, nothing like them had ever before been seen anywhere in the world. In the following January, he repeated his performance before the present King and Queen who were then in India as the Prince and the Princess of Wales. So pleased were they with Rammurti's strength that they gave hini a gold medal as a token of their apprecia-