iVErr books on Indian zoology. 179 



those of Brian Hodgson, Sir Walter Elliot, and that 19th century 

 Elizabethan, the late Colonel Yule. 



On men of this sort of culture the last few years have acted with 

 great force, and this is the state of things that has, for instance, 

 filled half a big house with the Anthropological and our own Society, 

 neither of them in receipt of any extraneous aid, nor impelled by 

 anj r power but the free will of their members. 



A society in this condition has naturally been clamorous for books 

 of reference, and a good deal of public money has been spent in 

 answering the demand. It is the fashion to say that Government 

 is stingy, but the truth is that Government has done a good deal in 

 this way. No province of any nation need be ashamed of the 

 Bombay Archaeological Survey and its splendid quartos, nor of the 

 Bombay Gazetteer, a new edition of which is already under dis- 

 cussion. 



A somewhat meagre Geological manual and a very good Meteoro- 

 logical one have been issued within the decade, and what we 

 wanted most was a set of tolerably cheap zoological manuals for all 

 India. 



The Secretary of State has undertaken the suppty, and entrusted 

 Mr. "W. Blanford, late of the Geological Survey of India, with the 

 superintend ence of it. It is not likely that he could have chosen a 

 better man for his work. 



An early scientific training, natural aptitude, and twenty years 

 of the East, are qualifications that may well bespeak confidence and 

 respect for the Editor of the Fauna of British India ; and if, in 

 examining his work, we find reason to complain of parts of it, he 

 may well ask us if we could have done better. 



It is, however, the duty of a critic to speak his mind without fear 

 or favour, and so we hope to do in reviewing the works noted at the 

 head of this article. 



Dr. Day's two volumes on " Fishes " are the only part of the " Fauna" 

 yet complete, and possess a melancholy interest as the last work on 

 earth of their author. He held on, under considerable difficulties, 

 until he had already been warned to "make his soul" for the 

 approaching end, and the present writer thinks that it wanted little 

 making. It is merely a cheap and portable abridgment of his great 



