PROCEEDINGS

OF THE

ASIATIC SOCIETY OF BENGAL.

FOR JULY, 1881.

The Monthly General Meeting of the Asiatic Society of Bengal was held on Wednesday, the 6th July 1881, at 9.15 P. M.

C. H. TAWNEY, Esq., M. A., Vice-President, in the Chair.

The minutes of the last Meeting were read and confirmed.

The following presentations were announced—

1. From the Home, Revenue and Agricultural Department,-Sherring's Hindu Tribes and Castes, vol. III.

2. From the authors,-(1) Die Culturländer des alten America; Die Voelker des oestlichen Asien: Studien und Reisen, vols. I, II and IV; Beiträge zur Ethnologie und darauf begründete Studien ; Mexico: Vortrag, gehalten in der Sing-Academie am 18 Januar 1868; and Remarks on the Indo-Chinese Alphabets, by Dr. A. Bastian, (2) Report on accessions to our knowledge of the Chiroptera during the past two years (1878-80); Report on the Geographical Distribution of the Chiroptera; and Sur quelques espèces de Chiroptères provenant d'une collection faite en Algérie par M. Fernand Lataste, by Dr. G. E. Dobson, (3) Bibliographie Générale de l'Astronomie, vol. II, pt. 2, by J, C. Houzeau and A. Lancaster, (4) Govinda Gitika by Raja Mahendralala Khan.

3. From the Panjab Government,-Glossary of the Multani Language compared with the Panjabi and Sindhi, by E. O'Brien.

4. From the Geological Society of London,-Catalogue of the Library of the Geological Society of London.

5. From A. W. Franks, Esq.,-List of Drawings from the Amravati Tope, Southern India, made for Col. C. Mackenzie, 1816-19, and preserved in the Library of the India Office.

6. From the Political Agent and Superintendent, Charkharee,-twelve copper coins.

The following Gentleman, duly proposed and seconded at the last meeting, was elected an Ordinary Member of the Society:

Prince Firukh Shah.

The following Gentleman is a candidate for election at the next meeting:

H. C. Barstow, Esq., C. S., Magistrate and Collector, Cawnpore, proposed by H. Rivett-Carnac, Esq., C. S., seconded by Dr. G. Thibaut.

The COUNCIL announced that the report of the Auditors of the Society's Accounts had been received, and that the suggestion of the Auditors, that the stock of Books be not entered as an Asset, had been approved.

Dr. HOERNLE exhibited a wax impression of a curious old seal of baked clay, found by Mr. Growse at Bulandshahr, and read the following note on the same and on the vases exhibited at the last meeting by Mr. Growse:

"My excavations at the Moti Bagh are still in progress and this morning the workmen turned up a curious old seal of baked clay, of which I enclose an impression. The oval is divided by two parallel lines into two equal compartments, in the upper of which are two devices, the one a conch shell, the other-which is raised on a little stand-looks like a wing and may possibly be intended for a chakwá. In the lower compartment is a name in early characters, probably of about the 5th century A. D., which I read as Sattila.

I have no doubt now that the vases exhibited at the last meeting are the finials of miniature Buddhist stupas, such as are not unfrequently found in old kheras. At first I looked upon them as too modern to allow of this suggestion holding good; but this discovery, on the same spot and at no greater depth, first of a Buddhist sculpture with an inscription in characters of about the 8th century A. D., and now of this seal which may be some 2 or 3 centuries older still, renders it probable that they too may be referred to a period equally remote, when Buddhism was the predominant religion of the neighbourhood."

Mr. BALL exhibited an ancient stone implement made of magnetic iron ore, and said that he was indebted for it to Mr. W. G. Olpherts, to whom it had been sent simply as a specimen of iron ore. Its history had not yet been fully ascertained but it was believed to have been obtained somewhere in the Narbada valley.

The material, magnetic oxide of iron, containing perhaps from 60 to 70 per cent. of iron, though admirably suited on account of its weight and toughness for making into a chipped implement, does not appear to have been often so employed. The present is in fact the only known specimen.

It might be suggested by some that the use of this material was a step in the direction of the substitution of iron for stone, but it would be difficult to prove such a proposition.

The following papers were read—

1. The Revenues of the Mughal Empire in India.-By EDWARD THOMAS, F. R. S., late Bengal C. S. (Abstract.)

In Volume XLIX of the Journal of the Society a paper was published by Mr. C. J. Rodgers on the "Copper Coins of Akbar," in which he entered into some speculations on the amount of the State Revenue of that monarch, based upon new interpretations of the legends of his coins, and considerably differing from the calculations of Mr. E. Thomas, in his "Revenue resources of the Mughal Empire." The present paper is a brief reply by Mr. Thomas. After mentioning that his calculations have been accepted as correct by Dr. Hunter, Mr. C. Markham and others, he shows that one of Mr. Rodgers' main arguments, based on his reading the word dim on Coin No. 4, falls to the ground, inasmuch as the word is not dám, but damṛá (i. e., a double damṛi). He similarly shows that Mr. Rodgers' second main argument is based on a confusion of the terms tankah and tánke.

This paper will be published in full in the Journal, Pt. I, No. 2, for 1881.

2. Description of a new species of Butterfly belonging to the genus Dodona.-By LIONEL DE NICEʼville.

[Received June 24th; Read July 6th, 1881.]

DODONA LONGICAUDATA, n. sp.

UPPERSIDE deep shining brown. Fore wing crossed before the middle by a broad white band which does not quite reach the costa, being narrowest at that point and divided by the nervules into two small spots. This band has its inner margin straight, the outer margin evenly convex. A submarginal series of six white spots placed irregularly. An indistinct marginal series of linear spots. Hind wing with the white band of the fore wing continued in a wedge-shaped figure across the disc of the wing, ending in a point just below the first submedian nervure. Abdominal

122

L. De Nicéville-Description of a new species of Butterfly. [JULY, area paler, with an indistinct white band from the base, and another short transverse one above the anal angle. Incomplete submarginal and marginal bands of white linear spots. Anal lobe black, encircled by a white line and thickly irrorated with white scales. Tail long, black; tip and cilia white.

UNDERSIDE rich bright brown, crossed by several silvery-white bands. Fore wing with narrow basal and subbasal bands, then a broad median band coincident with the band above but not reaching the costa; a short narrow costal band; then a very irregular broad band which is broken up into spots on the inner side below its middle; and lastly a marginal series of seven spots, the two upper ones rounded and out of line, the rest increasing, linear. The ground-colour near the outer angle becoming darker and almost forming two dark brown spots. Hind wing with the two basal and broad median bands as in the fore wing, but all meeting above the anal angle, at which point they are joined by two other white bands traversing the abdominal area. There is also a fourth band from the costa, short, narrow, submarginal, reaching the discoidal nervule, between which and the broad median band there is another narrow white line not reaching the costa, in continuation of which is an orange fascia terininating on the abdominal margin in a black linear spot, and bearing two black rounded spots at its upper extremity. Submarginal and mar⚫ginal white lines. Anal lobe jet-black, surmounted by a black, whiteirrorated space ending in a black spot on the abdominal margin, which space is divided from the lobe by a white line.

CILIA of fore wing brown, except a small portion near the inner angle; of the hind wing, alternately brown and white.

BODY above deep brown, with a somewhat rufous collar; beneath, white, with a black median abdominal line.

LEGS. The atrophied fore legs are pure white, the two posterior pairs have their tibiæ and tarsi ocraceous.

ANTENNE black, annulated with white.

A single specimen taken by the late Mr. J. P. Cock near Shillong, Assam, in November.

This species seems nearest allied to Dodona deodata, Hewitson, from Moulmein, figured in Plate I of Moore's "Desc. new Indian Lep. from coll. Atkinson," Part I, 1879, from which species it may readily be distinguished on the upperside in having only one median white band, being in fact altogether a much darker insect. D. deodata is apparently tailless, or the tails are rudimentary.

This is only the eighth species of this very interesting and compact little genus (all of which occur in India) as yet described. It is remark

1881.] O. Feist mantel-Sketch of the history of the Gondwana fossils. 123

able for the length of its tails, which are quite twice as long as those of D. egeon, Doubl. Hew., which species has them the next longest of the genus. It will be figured in the forthcoming work on The Butterflies of India, Burmah and Ceylon,' by Captain Marshall and myself.

3. Sketch of the history of the fossils of the Indian Gondwána system.-By O. FEISTMANTEL, M. D., Paleontologist, Geological Survey of India.

(Abstract.)

The fossils of the Indian Gondwána system, the most important series of sedimentary rocks in Peninsular India, have been now under examination for several years, and various memoirs have been published containing descriptions and illustrations of the vegetable and animal remains of this important rock-system. These fossils have been, however, hitherto treated of in a stratigraphical order only, according to the groups from which they were procured. A general review of the fossils in a biological order was hitherto wanting, and as only lately Mr. R. Lydekker gave a sketch of the history of the fossil Vertebrata in India in the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, the author thought it would prove of some use to write a similar sketch of the Gondwána fossils for publication in the same Journal.

A general review of the literature referring to Gondwána fossils is given, also a review of the various groups of the system with regard to the occurrence of fossils in them; then follows the enumeration of the fossils (vegetable and animal) in a systematical (biological) order, with indication of their geological and geographical distribution, and a few general remarks on the peculiarities of the fossils of this system conclude the paper.

This paper will be published in full in the Journal, Pt. II, No. 3, for 1881.

4. New and little known Mollusca belonging to the Indo-Malayan Fauna.By GEOFFREY NEVILL, C. M. Z. S.

(Abstract.)

This paper contains complete descriptions of certain species of Mollusca which were only briefly described in the author's Hand-list."

The plates include figures of most of the shells previously described by Mr. Nevill, but of which no illustrations have hitherto been published: thus one of the plates represents the brackish-water shells described in the Journal, Pt. II, No. 3, 1880.

In addition to the above there are descriptions of many new and important species lately discovered by Surgeon-Major R. Hungerford at