which he acted as physician to the Emperor Aurungzebe. He, therefore, saw the court of the Great Mogul in the zenith of its magnificence. He accompanied a nobleman in the imperial suite, on the temporary removal of the court to Cashmere; and he was an eye-witness of many of the principal transactions which distinguished the first ten years of the reign of the great Allumghire. His work is valuable, however, chiefly on account of the light which it throws upon the political state of the country at that period, and upon the manners and customs of the people under the dominion of their Moslem conquerors. It belongs to history, rather than to topography; for, with the exception of the Letters comprising the narrative of his excursion to Cashmere, there is little information of a geographical kind. It detracts too from the value of his work, that a considerable portion of it was drawn up from recollection after he had left the country. Thevenot (the younger) spent about fifteen months in the Deccan, during which time he collected a great deal of information respecting the almost unknown country, with the assistance chiefly, it is supposed, of the Capuchins of Surat. He saw but little of the country himself. Tavernier journeyed, according to his own account, through most of the provinces of the empire, and in more directions than any other traveller. He has given a number of routes, and his work contains a mass of curious and sometimes valuable materials.* But it was chiefly dictated from memory, in part from imagination; its statements often rest on mere hearsay authority, and the veracity of this Traveller is, in some instances,

*There is one subject to which he devoted more attention than any other traveller, namely, the diamond-mines of Golcondah and Orissa, of which the fullest account will be found in his Travels,

questionable. Carré, Dillon, De la Haye, and Fryer, all visited the peninsula between 1660 and 1680; but their opportunities of observation were extremely limited, and they are cited chiefly for the information they furnish as to the political state of the country at that period. De Graaf visited Patna in 1669, where the Dutch then had a factory; and Manderslo, in the year 1638, travelled from the capital of Gujerat to Agra, and afterwards to Bejapore in the Deccan. The latter, consequently, saw more of India than any traveller of the seventeenth century, except Tavernier; and his narrative, edited by Olearius, bears a high character for intelligence and fidelity.

The geography of India was still in a most crude and imperfect state, when, towards the close of the eighteenth century, Major Rennell gave to the public his invaluable "Memoir of a Map of Hindostan." In his preface, he remarks, that "we must not go much further back than thirty-five years (from 1788), for the matter that forms the basis of the map." The materials of which the learned author availed himself, consisted chiefly of the local information obtained by the marches of the British armies during the Mysore war; of astronomical observations and hydrographic surveys; together with the route of Mr. George Forster, in the year 1783-4, from Bengal, by way of Jummoo, to Cashmere. A short time before, a Mr. Hodges, who had, in the capacity of draftsman, accompanied Captain Cook in his voyage round the world, was tempted to undertake an excursion in search of the picturesque into India. He commenced his journey at Madras, but, being unable

Rennell, p. iv. In the time of D'Anville, the Brahmapootra was unknown as one of the principal rivers of India.

to penetrate into the interior, sailed for Calcutta ; whence he proceeded up the Ganges, to Monghir, and subsequently visited Patna, Benares, Lucknow, and Agra. His work is of little value or interest.

A considerable interval now occurs, during which no work of importance appeared relative to India, supplying additional information of a topographical or general nature. In the year 1800, Dr. Francis Buchanan (afterwards Hamilton) undertook a journey through Mysore, Canara, and Malabar, under the orders of Marquis Wellesley, for the purpose of investigating the state of agriculture, the arts and commerce, the manners and customs, &c. in Mysore and the ceded territories. His journal (published in this country in 1807, in three volumes 4to.) is a valuable but ill-arranged work, for the most part occupied with tedious statistical details, without any attempt at compression. Lord Valentia arrived at Calcutta in January 1803. He visited Benares, Lucknow, and Canouje; and subsequently, Madras, Bangalore, Seringapatam, and Mysore; Bombay, Poonah, and Chinchoor. His volumes are highly interesting, but are chargeable with a fault the very opposite of that which attaches to Dr. Buchanan's journal, being deficient in specific description and information. Mrs. Maria Graham went to India early in 1809; she spent some months in Bombay, during which curiosity induced her to make an excursion into the interior as far as Poonah; and she subsequently visited the island of Ceylon, Madras, and Calcutta, which was the termination of her Indian travels. Her journal, therefore, with the exception of Poonah and the capital of the Bengal Presidency, describes only the country immediately on the coast. In the same year (1813), however, a far more valuable and elaborate work was given to the

public, the "Oriental Memoirs" of Mr. Forbes. The Author has distributed over four volumes 4to., an immense mass of interesting information, the result of

seventeen years' residence in India ;" and it is only to be regretted that, owing to the extremely desultory, miscellaneous, and sentimental complexion of the contents, the work should have been unnecessarily swelled to so inconvenient dimensions. The Author of "Sketches of India" has presented us a slight but delightful volume, and we shall gladly avail ourselves of his picturesque illustrations. But the most important accession to our stores of information, incomparably, is the narrative of the lamented Bishop Heber, of whose admirable qualifications as a traveller, the notes to the Travels of his friend, Dr. D. E. Clarke, had supplied ample evidence. Those who have journeyed in India, will best appreciate the industry with which the Bishop kept his journal, which presents the vivid transcript of his first impressions on traversing the sphere of his jurisdiction. The activity of his mind seems to have been excited, rather than diminished, by an enervating and oppressive climate. Uniting with a constant reference to the primary object of his tour, and the business of his sacred office, the enthusiasm of the traveller, he extended his journey in all directions; exploring, in succession, the labyrinths of the Gangetic Delta, the fertile plains of Bengal and Bahar, the forests of Kumaoon, the roots of the mighty Himalaya, and the scorching sands of Gujerat. In the course of his brief administration, he visited both the other presidencies, besides making a tour in Ceylon. We cannot adopt a better plan, in the ensuing description, than to follow the Bishop through the regions which he explored; adhering for the most

part (though we must occasionally part company with our interesting guide) to the same route.

CALCUTTA.

AFTER a voyage of between three and four months, the sight of land is always welcome; but nothing can be more desolate and unpleasing than the entrance to the Hooghly, the sacred branch of the mighty Ganges, up which the voyager has yet to be piloted a hundred miles, before he reaches the capital. To the west, as far as the eye can reach, extend frightful breakers; and on the east, is seen the flat and swampy shore of the Island of Saugor, covered with jungle, about the height of young coppice-wood, with, here and there, tall trees, dark as firs. On approaching it, some ruinous cottages and barn-like buildings are descried, the remains of a village begun by a joint-company, who undertook, a few years ago, to cut down the thickets and reclaim the marshes of Saugor; but it was found that, as the woods were cut down on this side, the sea encroached, and the land was again abandoned to its wild deer and tigers. As the resort of the latter animals, the wilder parts of the island are much dreaded by the natives; and it is well, Bishop Heber remarks, that the terror they inspire, deters idle seamen and young officers from venturing on shooting excursions, so much as they otherwise would, on a shore so dreadfully pestilential as are all these marshy islets, beneath "a hot and copper sky." Saugor is still more infamous as the yearly scene of human sacrifice, where Hindoo mothers might once be seen throwing their infants into the jaws of the sea monsters. The temple of the infernal goddess,