ADVERTISEMENT. THE Governments of India publish on an average a volume every four days. From Reports affecting the entire Empire to accounts of local drainage, from the opinions of the ablest officers to the cost of a cutcha bye-road in a frontier province, every thing finds a place in these publications. There is scarcely a subject connected with Indian Administration on which they do not exhaust official knowledge. There is no officer in the country who may not obtain from them, in reference to his special task, all the advantages of experience. The information thus vast is, however, widely scattered. The Records of one Presidency are scarcely known in another. The books are not very readily pro. curable, and above all they are like all other blue books dry, illdigested, and overlaid with detail. It costs an hour to find a fact, and in India men who care about facts cannot spare hours. The object of the Compiler is to remove this defect, to de for the official information of India what Mr. Leone Levi is doing for the Blue Books of England. The Annals will comprise every fact, and almost every opinion of importance in the records of the quarter. A copious Index will enable the reader instantly to refer to the subject of which he is in search, and any peculiarity of opinion and even of style is carefully retained. A word may be necessary on the arrangement adopted. It is intended that the most important subject should have the largest space, but in estimating the relative importance of the records the Compiler has been compelled to rely on his own judgment. Usually all subjects of imperial interest have the preference, statistics occupy the next place, and subjects purely historical the last. The only exception to this rule is in the case of records like the History of the Rohilcund Survey. They are not very important, and not at all interesting, but they can only be condensed to a certain point. Of the labour thus saved to the public, but one illustration must suffice. The Number contains 132 pages. The books analyzed comprize just two thousand five hundred. |