Preface. vii 



and the demand for early numbers for the completion of sets 

 has far exceeded the means possessed of furnishing them. The 

 series of the Gleanings is quite out of print, so much so as to 

 have led the Editor to contemplate a reprint of its most valu- 

 able original articles : and even the volumes of the Journal for 

 the years from 1832 to 1835, that is for the first three years 

 after the Periodical assumed the title of Journal of the Asiatic 

 Society, are procurable now with extreme difficulty, our Pub- 

 lishers having no spare copies on hand. 



We close the year 1838 with a subscription list of 325 

 names; besides the copies furnished to Government and to the 

 Asiatic Society* or exchanged with other periodicals, consti- 

 tuting a circulation of upwards of 500, the good-will of which 

 we freely make over to the conductors of the new series, in 

 the confident hope, that they will worthily follow in the same 

 career, and through their exertions daily win fresh proofs of 

 the favor and confidence of the public. 



The retrospect of the past management is to us a source of 

 pride and much satisfaction. The advance that has been made 

 in every branch of Science and of Indian Research, since the 

 Journal fell into the late Editor's hands, will not fail to strike 

 every observer ; and few will deny to himself and to his Perio- 

 dical, a large share of the merit of producing this great result. 



Wide indeed has been the range of subjects which have been 

 illustrated in the volumes of this Journal. In Astronomy no 

 phenomenon has appeared, that has not been fully explained 

 with its calculations. In Natural History the Journal has been 

 enriched by the valuable contributions of Colonel Sykes, of 

 Hodgson and Dr. Evans, of Drs. Griffith, McClelland, 

 Pearson* Falconer and Helfer, of Benson and Hut- 

 ton, and these with many others have through our pages de- 

 vute.d themselves to the classification of known objects, or to the 

 description of new specimens, so as to render the Journal a ne- 

 cessary book of reference to Zoologists, Botanists, Concholo- 

 gists, Entomologists, and to the learned in almost every other 

 branch of this Department of Science. 



In Chemistry Dr. O'Shaughnessy, to whom the editorial 

 chair is now resigned, Dr. Pearson, and Mr. Piddington have 

 combined with the late Editor himself to apply every kind of 



