264 EE VIEWS OF BOOKS. [Aug. 



Keviews of ^ooks. 



Beport on Forest Administration in the Chota Nagpore Division of 

 Bengal. By W. Schlich, Ph.D., Inspector-General of Forests 

 to the Government of India. With one Map. Calcutta, 

 1885. 



THE Chota Nagpore Division, subdivided into four districts and 

 a number of tributary states, consists of a series of plateaux, 

 one of which is 4500 square miles, and another 600 square miles. 

 Some of the hills intersecting these deeply-serrated districts — for one 

 of them is called " the land of seven hundred hills " — are high, one 

 attaining 3600 feet. While the tributary states have only an 

 average density of population of 42 per square mile, and have large 

 forest tracts, not requiring any further interference than that ex- 

 ercised by the Commissioner in his annual tours of inspection, the 

 forest needs of the population in the British districts, ranging from 

 121 to 255 per square mile, demand urgent attention. Now the 

 percentage of the Government reserved forests in the total area of 

 public lands is only 3-6 per cent., and it is apparently impossible 

 to raise this to a higher ratio than 4 per cent. Again, the principal 

 private forests range from 10*4 to 6*4 per cent. If these could be 

 preserved without forcing Government to buy them, the normal 

 limit of safety desirable, viz. 1 per cent, of forest to the total area, 

 might be attained. But the Inspector-General thinks it is necessary 

 for Government to purchase at least 1500 square miles for forest 

 purposes. Half measures will no longer suffice. The zamindars 

 are rapidly consuming the interest and capital represented by their 

 forests ; and forest produce must soon rise in price throughout the 

 division. 



Sport, Travel, and Adventure in Neivfoundland and the West Indies. 

 By Captain W. E. Kennedy, E.N. With Illustrations. 

 Edinburgh: W. Blackwood & Sons. 1885. 



From 1879 to 1882 inclusive, H.M.S. Druid was engaged cruising 

 on the North American and West India stations ; and this well- 

 written and entertaining volume gives the varied experiences of her 

 commander, whether as magistrate in the solitary bays and arms of 

 Newfoundland, where field sports mingled with legal duties, or as 

 ouardian of the British interests at Haiti, or the Mosquito coast. 

 This fresh honest narrative of a seaman contains interesting forestal 



