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REVIEWS, NOTES, NEWS.

Messrs. Luzac and Co. have great pleasure in announcing the publication of Part 36 of "The Encyclopædia of Islam." This part brings to completion Volume 2 of this very important work. Binding cases for this volume can be supplied in half-bound green morocco at ten shillings.

Sir E. A. W. Budge: "The Divine Origin of the Craft of the Herbalist," 96 pp., 13 illustrations. This little book is addressed particularly to those who are interested in the history of the use of herbs for medicinal purposes, but will serve to inform many who have no knowledge of the inaccessible researches of Orientalists into the early developments of medicine. After discussing the ancient Oriental views of the gods as the teachers of the healing art, and of the religious ideas about water and plants, Sir Wallis Budge gives a succinct account of what is known from Egyptian and Babylonian sources, and shows that, despite the inextricable confusion of magic and medicine, a basis of really scientific practice may be found in texts written as early as 2000 B.C. A summary account of Greek and Latin herbals is followed by a similar treatment of Syriac, Arabic, Coptic and Abyssinian documents bearing on the subject. This very readable account of an abstruse matter includes useful lists of the herbs used at different periods, and an amusing description of a herbalist's shop in the nineteenth century in London; it should be welcomed, not only by those to whom it is addressed, but by the general reader, who will not find so much information on early medicine (particularly as regards Egypt, Babylonia and Abyssinia) in so handy a form elsewhere.

The first volume of the late Sir Henry Howorth's monumental "History of the Mongols" appeared in 1876, and from the time of the completion of his work to the date of his death the author was constantly occupied in collecting new materials to supplement and perfect it. His death prevented him from issuing the revised and enlarged edition which he had long contemplated; but his sons have happily published a supplement to the great work, which com prises much of the new material collected by their father, to serve as an introduction to the History, together with indices to the whole work compiled by Mrs. Maud Davis. The additional matter in the present volume consists of a general view of the geography, ethnography and biology of Central Asia (Chapter I), followed by accounts of the character, home-life and surroundings of the Mongols (Chapter II), and their religion, ritual and magical practices (Chapter III), for which the author has gathered his materials from a wide area of learning. Beyond question the value of the History, already high. will be greatly enhanced by the publication of this supplement, and the filial duty that has prompted its issue deserves grateful recognition on the part of the many students who have benefited by Sir Henry Howorth's learned labours.

"Essays and Criticisms," by Syamacharana Ganguli, B.A., Hon. Fellow, Calcutta University, etc. This little book contains fifteen articles contributed to the "Calcutta Review" and "The Modern Review" during the last fifty years by the author, who is now nearly ninety, and who has been for long well-known as an independent and vigorous critic on questions of scholarship, philology, economics and politics. Whether or not readers agree with the Babu on all points, they cannot fail to be impressed by his sincerity, thoughtfulness and learning.

The longest and perhaps the most suggestive essay in the book is that on Bengali, Spoken or Written," and the philological articles generally, such as The International Phonetic Script" and "The Undesirability of Devanagari being Adopted as the Common Script for All India" (in which an interesting proposal for an "Indo-Roman" alphabet for Hindustani is put forward) are decidedly arresting. In the political articles, such as No. 12 ("SelfDetermination and India's Future Political Status "), Mr. Ganguli's views are shown to be moderate, and the articles are a favourable illustration of the opinions of broad-minded Indians on the problems confronting their country. The book concludes with an intimate account of some of the author's college reminiscences, which is especially interesting as he was one of the earliest graduates of Calcutta University.

"Racial Synthesis in Hindu Culture," by Mr. S. V. Viswanatha, which forms part of Trübner's Oriental Series, is, in the author's own words, an attempt to present the history of Hindu society and culture, having due regard to the non-Aryan contribution to Indian civilization." He rightly realises that Hindu culture is a compound, the result of the fusion of an "Aryan" with other races, and he accordingly studies the process of this combination of stocks and civilizations from the earliest times, beginning with the Vedic age, and thence going on to the later Vedic period, the Epic age, and the age of modern Hinduism. Mr. Viswanatha has read widely, and his general conclusions are in the main sound. It may, however, be said that although they may be true they are not new; in fact, the composite nature of Indian culture has become almost a truism. On the other hand, we must confess that we find some difficulty in accepting some of Mr. Viswanatha's evidences. It is high time that scholars gave up the puerile practice of euhemerising figures like Rāvaṇa, Rakshasas, Vānaras, and the rest, and frankly recognised that they are essentially mythical; and in other respects too--for instance, a certain readiness to accept a pious story as an irrefutable document of factMr. Viswanatha seems to us to show a lack of the strict critical spirit which should dominate the historian.

"The Osmania Magazine." Being the Journal of the students of the Osmania University College, Hyderabad, Deccan. Edited by Syed Fazle Haq. The Osmania University has set the interesting example of adopting Urdu as its medium of instruction in all subjects, and it is accordingly natural that its college magazine should be mainly written in that language. As a matter of fact, about a quarter of this, the first, number is in English. The number contains about forty articles and poems in all, on a very wide range of subjects, mainly literary, historical and economical. Controversial questions of religion and politics are excluded. Translations from foreign writers and articles by eminent persons outside the university take up rather more space than we should have expected, but there is plenty of other material and, judging from the opening number, the magazine seems likely to fulfil with success the manifold purposes of such publications, as a unifying force, a record of university life and work, a centre of literary exercise for students, and an educative agent. The magazine is very well printed and produced.

"Miratushshir," by Maulvi Abdur Rahman, Head of the Department of Arabic, Persian and Urdu, University of Delhi. Handbooks dealing with what may be called the mechanics of the poetry of the Muhammadan languages are common enough, but Mr. Abdur Rahman in this carefully written Urdu study is concerned less with the details of rhetoric and prosody than with the theory of poetical taste and the elements of which poetry is composed. Though, however, this book starts from the most general theoretical bases, it is by no

means confined to generalities, each point being illustrated by quotations from Arabic, Persian and Urdu poets. Revealing as it does a wide acquaintance with Muhammadan poetical theory and practice, this scholarly and clearly written book should be of great service to all who wish to enlarge their knowledge of the subject with which it is concerned.

That the archæological mission under the direction of M. Foucher despatched by the French Government to investigate the antiquities of Afghanistan has succeeded in obtaining some remarkable results is well known, and some of these results have already been made known; but it is only now, by the publication of the first of their detailed "Mémoires "' (Paris and Brussels, G. Van Oest), that we are able to form some conception of the immense importance and commanding interest of their discoveries. The magnificent folio volume before us, "Les Antiquités Bouddhiques de Bamiyan," by M. André Godard, Madame Godard, and M. J. Hackin (which, though numbered as second in the series of the "Mémoires de la Délégation Archéologique Française en Afghanistan,” is the first to appear), may be fairly said to be epoch-making: as M. Senart remarks in his introduction, by the points of contact which it reveals in Bāmiyān not only with India but likewise with Central Asia and Sasanian Iran it places Afghanistan in its true historical position, and throws a ray of light upon the course of civilisation and art in inner Asia. Bāmiyān is a dreary and poverty-stricken valley amidst the grim mountains north-west of Kabul, but once it was a rich and populous centre of Buddhist worship. Probably, as M. Foucher has suggested, it owed its wealth and religious popularity to two facts: the first is that it was a half-way house in the great traderoute between India and Central Asia, and the second, which is even more important, is that nature has furnished it with a vast cliff of tertiary conglomerate, the high vertical sides of which lend themselves readily to the construction of caves and colossal statues of the Buddha. Here, therefore, piety and wealth combined, probably from the first century until the victory of Islam, to immortalise religion by means of art; here were carved in the hill-side two colossal standing images of the Buddha, fifty-three metres and thirty-five metres in height, besides some others, and a series of caves skilfully cut in the rock for the dwellings of friars, and adorned with the finest paintings. Now for the first time we have, thanks to the French Mission, a detailed and splendidly illustrated study of this remarkable art. A special interest attaches to the frescoes, of which the most striking are found in the niches of the largest of the standing Buddha-figures and some of the seated statues. They may be tentatively assigned to the fifth or sixth century, and thus, next to the frescoes of Miran in Turkestan and the ninth and tenth caves of Ajanta, they are the most ancient Buddhist paintings known; and although they fall far short of the complete mastery shown in Ajanta and Bagh, several of them display a remarkably fascinating vigour and liveliness of sweeping line. Archæologically, too, they are most important, showing on an Indian basis influences of Iranian art, and possibly some traces of Chinese also. Much valuable information is likewise furnished regarding the caves of Bamiyan, including those in the adjacent valley of Kakrak, which date from about the first century onwards, and are interesting on account both of their structure and of their decoration, when they are decorated. Space forbids us to dwell upon these aspects of the work, but we may call attention to the use in some caves of the cupola on an angular base, an element borrowed from Persia. A final chapter is devoted to Dokhtar-i-Nōshirwan, where a large composition painted in a niche on the face of the rock, now unhappily much damaged by the ravages of time and vandals, commemorates the glories of the Sasanian kingdom; and the volume concludes with an appendix of texts relating to Bamiyan and indexes. The

forty-eight plates, of which four are coloured, are as perfect as plates of the kind can be, the printing and paper are admirable, and in every respect the memoir is one that reflects abundant credit upon the able authors and the publishers.

"The Ottoman Empire and its Successors, 1801-1927." By William Miller (Cambridge Historical Series). This is the third edition, brought up to date, of "The Ottoman Empire," which first appeared just before the war. The author is a well-known authority on the Balkans, and there could be no better guide through the complex but exciting story of Europe's storm-centre. Dr. Miller is true to the tradition of good historians in having a bias, for he is quite openly prejudiced against Turkey. Most of his readers will, indeed, be inclined to agree with him in this, after considering the long record of Turkish misrule in Europe, where Turkish government was represented by a habit of tolerant indifference punctuated by periodical massacres and will share his satisfaction that Turkey has at last, apparently, realised that her destiny lies in Asia, and not in Europe. Nevertheless there are many Englishmen who learned during the war to know and appreciate the many attractive qualities of the Turkish character, who will regret that Dr. Miller has not made more of those qualities. At any rate, the Balkan countries have now emerged from the numbing grasp of Turkish suzerainty, and the war has advanced their independence a step further in liberating them from Russian and Austrian influence. They are now free to develop and progress at peace. Dr. Miller warns us, however, not to expect too much at first of races which have till recently been immersed in "the long night of Turkish rule."

Turkey was spoken of as a sick man one hundred and fifty years ago, and her disappearance from Europe began in 1699 and has been continuing ever since. The Near Eastern question, viewed as the problem of filling up the vacuum created by the slow withdrawal of Turkey, therefore arose one hundred years before the nineteenth century opened. These first one hundred years are here sketched in rather lightly, and it is with the nineteenth century that the author begins his history proper. Behind the thrilling details that fill these crowded years, the diplomatic triumphs and failures, the tale of massacres, intrigues, and enthusiasms, that affected the course of European history again and again, we are able to discern the slow development of racial movements, of which the most enduring and important is that movement towards emancipation for which Greece and Serbia are entitled to the main credit. Whether a nation which treats its greatest statesmen as Greece has treated M. Venizélos will continue to command outside respect as of old is open to question; but there are stabler elements in the Balkans which give ground for at least a modified optimism about the future of a region which is still, though less so than before the war, a potential danger-centre.

"Economic Principles for Indian Readers." A Course in the Elements of Economics. By Dr. Praphullachandra Basu, Principal, Holkar College, Indore. Dr. Praphullachandra Basu's work, which is intended primarily for students, but which deserves to find a wider public, aims at a clear explanation of the fundamental principles of economics, with illustrations drawn, not, as in other books on the subject, from European and American conditions, but from those of India. As far as we are aware, nothing of the sort has been previously attempted on a comprehensive scale, and Indian beginners have hitherto been set the arduous task of looking outside their textbooks to fit the principles of economic theory to the facts of life, in a country where economic conditions and problems are by no means the same as in the West. This was unfortunate on many accounts. As an expounder of principles the author does not profess