ADVERTISEMENT TO FIRST EDITION. I HAVE frequently been requested to reprint my various communications to the Times Newspaper, Athenæum, Indian Antiquary, and other periodicals- many of which were written during my recent travels in India. The following pages are put forth in compliance with the request. They are not a mere reproduction of what has already appeared. Much additional matter has been added, and an attempt has been made to connect the series in some sort of order corresponding to the course of my travels. They need no preface, nor introduction. They may be left to speak for themselves. A further series of Essays embodying my principal researches into Modern Indian religious life will, I hope, be published hereafter. OXFORD, April, 1878. ADVERTISEMENT TO THIRD EDITION. THIS Edition will be found a great improvement on those that preceded it. I have taken care to avail myself of all such criticisms on particular passages in the previous editions as appeared to me to be just, and I have enlarged the work by considerably more than a hundred pages of additional matter. The chapter on the 'Villages and Rural Population of India' and several other sections of the work are quite new. Most of the matter in the two Essays on the Progress of our Indian Empire' appeared originally in the Contemporary Review. M. W. OXFORD, September, 1879. CONTENTS. PAGE General Impressions and Notes after Travels in Northern India General Impressions and Notes after Travels in Southern India Indian and European Civilization in their relation to each other and |