Falconry in the Valley of the Indus.

• Author: Rocher, Ludo
• Position: Review

By RICHARD E BURTON. Third edition. Oxford in Asia Historical Reprints. Karachi: DEPARTMENT OF CULTURE, GOVERNMENT OF SINDH and OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS, 1997. Pp. xxiv + 83; 4 plates. $21.95.

In 1849 Richard Francis Burton (1821-90) returned to England, after spending seven years in India, mainly in Sindh as a member of the Sindh Survey. Soon after his return he published four books. Goa and the Blue Mountains (1851) was based on the diaries he kept while on sick leave in Goa and the Nilgiris. The other three were devoted to Sindh: Sindhe, or the Unhappy Valley (1851); the more important Sindh, and the Races that Inhabit the Valley of the Indus (1851); and Falconry in the Valley of the Indus (London: John van Voorst, 1852; 2nd ed. 1971). The latter volume, which has become very rare, is now again made available in a beautiful luxury edition, with an introduction by Christopher Ondaatje, the author of Sindh Revisited: A Journey in the Footsteps of Captain Sir Richard Francis Burton, 1842-1849 (1996).

Few of those who peruse our Journal may feel inclined to read about the technical aspects of falconry. Yet, "[t]o obviate, if possible, the dryness of a regular treatise, I have attempted a narrative form, describing a visit paid some years ago to one Meer Ibrahim Khan, a scion of the House of Talpur, lately reigning in Scinde, and a falconer of distinguished fame" (p. xxiii). Besides, I encourage anyone who needs information on Indian terms connected with falconry to...