About the Book Whalley provides us a short summary of the history of Kumaun under the British and a chronological table of important matters affecting the judicial and revenue administration of Kumaun. Its most significant contribution is retrival of those excerpts, which Whalley was fortunately able to secure, during his visits to several offices. A large number of the files, which originally contained these memos, exist no more.

Whalley was directed by the Government, in July 1869, to collect and arrange information regarding the laws in force in these Non- Regulation districts. To accomplish this task he had to search through a correspondence spanning a period well over half a century. He has chronologically listed all Regulations and Acts, enacted, exempted or extended. He also gives a resume of the administrative changes of each district, to serve both as an index to its original legislation and the causes out of which it sprang, and also as a chronicle of the development of its legal and judicial systems.

Whalley's conclusions, it would be found, successfully unfold the mystique, that one often confronts, if unaided by this seminal work; wading through volumes after volumes of proceedings and official correspondence, so clinically catalogued and indexed now by Dewar, kept in various record rooms and archives. In short, Whalley's work is the magical-code without which it is impossible to decipher the true meaning of millions of words which constitute to Kumaun Records.

Introduction Ample materials for a complete and detailed history of the administration of the East India Company and the Crown in Kumaun-Garhwal exist. These, however, lie scattered in various English Record Rooms of Dehradun, Pauri-Garhwal, Tehri-Garhwal, Nainital and Almora Collectorates. Bareilly district's own Pre Mutiny Records have by and large been destroyed but owing to a very methodical correspondence-system, followed by the British, a considerable portion still survives in the State Archives, Lucknow. All English Pre Mutiny Records have been catalogued and indexed by Douglas Dewar. (1) Of this vast material available some important records have been officially printed. While John Hallet Batten's Official Reports on the Province of Kumaon, containing his final settlement reports and the history of previous settlements, were published officially, George William Traill's competently compiled works found their way into the Asiatic Researches. (2). Col. Gowan's Report on the Mahamari and Batten's several essays, edited or original, were readily received by the editors of the Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal.(3). All these writings add considerably to our knowledge of these hill-tracts and can be easily found, with some effort. Surprisingly, P.Whalley's, The Law of Extra-regulation Tracts, devoting nearly 200 pages to Kumaun and Turai, is not so readily available. Whalley provides us a short summary of the history of Kumaun under the British and a chronological table of important matters affecting the judicial and revenue administration of Kumaun. But, in my view, its most significant contribution is retrieval of those excerpts, which Whalley was fortunately able to secure, during his visits to several offices. A large number of the files, which originally contained these memos, exist no more.