-1836.] 



Notices of Books, 



151 



" Subordinate to either of the other two questions, is; whether the 

 whole mythological legend of the great Pagoda at Madura, has not 

 been made, by the Brahmins of a former day, to turn upon the visit of 

 the hero of the Mahabharata to the chief or king of that town, and 

 marrying his daughter, as the Mahabharata itself asserts he did. The 

 question is important only as to the origin of mythological fictions ; 

 and the reader of the work must decide. Faint indications may be 

 perceived of an hypothesis tracing the influx of Brahmins into Hin- 

 dustan, on all hands confessedly from the north-west, to a migration 

 of a portion of the ten Tribes of Israel from their allotted station in 

 Chaldea. Such an hypothesis, however, would require much further 

 support to make it square with all Hindu records : hence it is cautiously 

 introduced, with the expression of a wish to see the affirmative and 

 negative arguments brought together in one synopsis ; and, certainly, 

 if such a synopsis be possible, it is desirable." 



2. — Illustrations of the Botany, and other branches of the Natural His- 

 tory of the Himalayan Mountains, and of the Flora of Cashmere. — 

 By J. F. Royle, Esq., f. L. s., f. g. s., fyc. of the H. E. J. C. Medical 

 Establishment. 



The early parts of this work have been already noticed, in No. 5 

 of this Journal, in an able article from the pen of Dr. Wight j we have 

 no w to note its progress in publication, the eighth number having lately 

 reached India. The letter press and illustrations display undiminished 

 interest and beauty. The latter exhibit the most successful application 

 of the art of lithography to the illustration of natural history, that we 

 are acquainted with, and we conclude it is to the employment of the 

 stone that we are to attribute the moderate cost of the parts (20s), there 

 being ten or eleven plates to each, with between thirty and forty pages 

 of letter press, large quarto, most of the plates containing two, and many 

 three, representations of botanical or zoological objects. 



In No. 8 is the commencement of an account of the varieties of 

 the tobacco plant, and the modes of culture best suited to it, which we 

 shall notice when completed, as it relates to a staple article of Indian 

 produce, and cannot but be of importance to the commerce and revenues 

 of Madras. 



We extract the following from a notice of Mr. Royle's work in the 

 last number of the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society : 



" India, according to its natural boundaries, stretches from 35° to 

 22°, with its peninsula extending to 8° of north latitude, and from 67 0 

 to 95° degrees of east longitude. Its extreme length and breadth are 

 nearly equal, viz., about 2,000 miles : but its figure is so irregular that 



