First published in 1906, this classic nine-volume history of the nation of India places it among the storied lands of antiquity, alongside Egypt, China, and Mesopotamia. Edited by American academic ABRAHAM VALENTINE WILLIAMS JACKSON (1862-1937), professor of Indo-Iranian languages at Columbia University. It offers a highly readable narrative of the Indian people and culture through to the time of its publication, when the nation was still part of the British Empire. Volume VIII, From the Close of the Seventeenth Century to the Present Time, by British scholar SIR ALFRED COMYN LYALL (1835-1911), features entertaining and enlightening treatments of: - early competition for Indian commerce - influence and connections of politics in Europe and Asia - the French and English East India companies - the second French war - the conquest of Bengal - administrative organization - Warren Hastings, Lord Cornwallis.