INTRODUCTION. 



GENERAL. 



The country, the flora of which is here dealt with, has a 

 total area of about 37,403 square miles. It includes the Chota 

 Nagpur civil division which, with its political states, and, the 

 native state of Gangpur (2,484 square miles >, has an area of 

 31,934 square miles, and the district of the Stmtal Parganahs 

 (5,469 square mibs) belonging to the Bhagalpur civil divi- 

 sion. This district is included because it not only resembles 

 Chota Nagpur botanically and topographically, but because 

 by its inclusion the flora is made to embrace all the forest 

 divisions in the west of Bengal, with the exception of the 

 recently added Sambalpur district, 1 which has not yet been 

 botanically investigated. 



The woody vegetation of Sambalpur, as well as of the greater 

 part of the Monghyr and JBhagaljpur districts south of the 

 Ganges and the laterite plateau of JMdnapiir, though not 

 nominally included, will probably present very few species not 

 here described. Broadly speaking the tract dealt with lies 

 between 22° and 25° N. latitude, and between 84° and 87° 

 longitade. It forms the eastern extension of the vast elevated 

 region formed by the confluence of the Satpura and 

 Vindyhan mountain ranges, and from which flow the 

 large rivers Narbada (dividing those ranges) to the west, 

 the Sone, which forms a part of our north-western boundary, 

 to the north, and the Mahanadi and the Brahmini to the 

 south and east. Some of the tributaries of the latter lie in 



1 Sambalpur belonged to the Central Provinces until the partition of 

 Bengal in 1905. Before that date Chota Nagpur also included the Nativo 

 States of Sirguja, Jashpur, Udaipur, Korea and Chang Bhakar, which are 

 hence occasionally referred to in the flora', though their area is not in- 

 cluded in the above statement. 



