ished the ambition of universal Indian dominion, and severally attained it in a greater or less degree. But not one of them attained it completely, and this failure implies a lack of unity in political history which renders the task of the historian difficult.
The same difficulty besets the historian of Greece still more pressingly; but, in that case, with the attainment of unity, the interest of the history vanishes. In the case of India the converse proposition holds good, and the reader's interest varies directly with the degree of unity attained, the details of Indian annals being insufferably wearisome except when generalized by the application of a bond of political union.
A history of India, if it is to be read, must necessarily be the story of the predominant dynasties, and either ignore, or relegate to a very subordinate position, the annals of the minor states. Elphinstone acted upon this principle in his classic work, and practically confined his narrative to the transactions of the Sultans of Delhi and their Mogul successors. The same principle has been applied in this book, and attention has been concentrated upon the dominant dynasties which, from time to time, have attained or aspired to paramount power.
Twice in the long series of centuries dealt with in this history, the political unity of all India was nearly attained: first, in the third century B.C., when Asoka's empire extended to the latitude of Madras; and again, in the fourth century A.D., when Samudragupta carried his victorious arms from the Ganges to the extremity
