If you care for geology, there is work for you from the Himâlayas to Ceylon.
If you are fond of botany, there is a flora rich enough for many Hookers.
If you are a zoologist, think of Haeckel, who is just now rushing through Indian forests and dredging in Indian seas, and to whom his stay in India is like the realisation of the brightest dream of his life.
If you are interested in ethnology, why India is like a living ethnological museum.
If you are fond of archæology, if you have ever assisted at the opening of a barrow in England, and know the delight of finding a fibula, or a knife, or a flint in a heap of rubbish, read only 'General Cunningham's Annual Reports of the Archæological Survey of India,' and you will be impatient for the time when you can take your spade and bring to light the ancient Vihâras or Colleges built by the Buddhist monarchs of India.
If ever you amused yourselves with collecting coins, why the soil of India teems with coins, Persian, Carian, Thracian, Parthian, Greek, Macedonian, Scythian, Roman[1] and Mohammedan. When Warren Hastings was Governor-General, an earthen pot was found on the bank of a river in the province of Benares, containing 172 gold Darics[2]. Warren Hastings considered himself as making the most munificent present to his masters that he might
- ↑ Pliny (VI. 26) tells us that in his day the annual drain of bullion into India, in return for her valuable produce, reached the immense amount of 'five hundred and fifty millions of sesterces.' See E. Thomas, The Indian Balhará, p. 13.
- ↑ Cunningham, in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1881, p. 184.
