More than one hundred years ago. W. T. Blanford (1901) wrote, "For the study of zoological distribution there are few, if any, regions on the earth's surface that exceed British India and its dependencies in interest". Personally I fully agree with him. And I hope, after going through the pages of this book, the readers would realize how true Blanford was. "British India', covering some 40 degrees of latitudes and nearly the same of longitudes, possesses the most diverse climatic conditions and physical features, including arid desert, savanna grassland, thorny bushes, deciduous and tropical evergreen rainforests, and montane evergreen as well as mangrove swamp forests. There are also vast alluvial plains, the loftiest mountain covered with perpetual snow, as well as lengthy coastal areas. Geologically, 'British India' has some of the oldest and youngest land formations, and some areas rising froin the bottom of the sea in the Tertiary and Quaternary forming the highest mountain of the world which is believed to be still rising. These features and the past history of the area make the study of the zoogeography of the Indian sub-continent a most fascinating subject.. Early workers like Sclater (1858), Wallace (1876). Blanford (1901) and others made extremely valuable contributions. Also, during the earlier part of the 20th century, some workers like Meinertzhagen (1928)..