2 28 Journal of Travel and Natural History 



more than a cursory survey of the contents of such an extensive 

 compilation, but this we will endeavour to do as briefly as possible. 



The first volume commences with a biographical sketch of 

 Dr Falconer's career ; from which we learn that he was born at 

 Forres, in the north of Scotland, on the 29th of February 1808, 

 and after the usual course of scholastic and academical education in 

 Aberdeen and Edinburgh, took his degree as M.D. in the year 1829, 



Earnestly devoted to Natural History rather than to purely pro- 

 fessional studies, his attention, upon receiving an appointment as 

 Assistant-Surgeon in the East India Company's service in that 

 year, was at once directed to it. 



He proceeded to London and spent the time he was compelled 

 to wait before his departure to India, partly in assisting Dr 

 Wallich in the arrangement of his Herbarium, and partly in the 

 study of Geology, with the aid of Mr Lonsdale, and in the Museum 

 of the Geological Society. 



Well prepared by previous studies on the same subjects in 

 Scotland, he could not fail thus to become an accomplished 

 botanist and geologist ; qualifications which were speedily turned to 

 account on his arrival in India in 1830, where, almost immediately 

 after his landing, he distinguished himself by the publication of a 

 paper on some fossil bones which had been collected in Ava, by 

 Mr John Crawford and others. Early in the following year, 

 having been ordered to Meerut in the north-west provinces, Dr 

 Falconer discharged his first and last military duty, in taking 

 charge of a detachment of invalids proceeding to Landoor in the 

 Himmalayahs. This march, however, proved to be the turning 

 point of his whole subsequent career. The route lay through 

 Suharunpoor, where at that time the late Dr Royle was Super- 

 intendent of the Botanical Garden, and whose duties, during a 

 leave of absence, were committed to Dr Falconer, by whom in 

 the following year he was permanently succeeded. Thus, " at the 

 early age of twenty-three, did he find himself advanced to a re- 

 sponsible and independent public post," and this, fortunately, in a 

 situation " which offered to a naturalist the most enviable oppor- 

 tunities for research." 



Suhanmpoor, situated at the immediate foot as it were of the 

 Himmalayahs, from which it is only separated by a low interven- 

 ing range of hills, was a field especially favourable to the naturalist. 

 Of the advantages afforded by this favoured site, Dr Falconer lost 

 no time in av^ling himself. He at once commenced the exploration 



