2 THE NATURAL HISTOET REVIEW. 



years ago was refused all assistance, is now promised substantial 

 aid. Dr. Jerdon, who has undertaken the very arduous task of 

 preparing a set of Mammals of the Natural History of the Ver- 

 tebrate Animals, specially adapted for India, is, as we learn from the 

 preface of the portion relating to the Birds, now complete, permitted 

 to draw his full pay as Surgeon-Major while engaged in editing hia 

 work. So that we must allow that what with the advancing position 

 occupied by Science of late years, and, perhaps we should add, under 

 the influence of the hitherto unheard of event of a surplus in the 

 Indian Exchequer, things are looking a little more bright for the 

 Naturalist in British India. 



It is indeed with no small satisfaction we are able to call the 

 attention of our readers at one time to three different publications 

 on the Zoology of India — one relating to the Mammals, a second to 

 the Birds, and a third to the Eeptiles ; which, although of very 

 different orders of merit as regards the information they contain 

 and the labour bestowed upon them, will each alike serve as a basis 

 for some general remarks upon those parts of the Fauna of British 

 India of which they treat. 



To begin with the Mammals — Mr. Blyth's recently issued cata- 

 logue, of which the title stands at the bead of our list, does not 

 relate solely to the Mammals of India, but is, in fact, a list only of 

 those of which specimens are contained in the Museum of the 

 Asiatic Society of Bengal at Calcutta. This well known Institution, 

 which has done so much for the progress of the Natural Sciences in 

 our Eastern possessions, acquired the services of Mr. Blyth as its 

 Curator in 1841. At that time, as may be seen by reference to the 

 loth volume of the Society's Journal,* the collection of Mammals in 

 the Society's Museum was meagre indeed, consisting only of some 

 thirty specimens. How laboriously the new Curator set to work to 

 develope the collections under his care — how the civil and military 

 officials of every part of our Indian Empire were pressed into the 

 service of Natural History, and induced to contribute specimens to 

 the Museum and facts to the Journal of the Society — is well known 

 to every Naturalist, who has paid attention to the Zoology of the East. 

 The value of the contributions made by Mr. Blyth to our knowledge 

 of the Natural History of India, during the twenty-four years of his 



* Catalogue of Mammalia in the Museum of the Asiatic Society. By 

 T. C. Tearson. Journ. A. S. B. x. p. 660, 



