INDIAN GEOLOGY. 133 



flora, is found in South Africa, it is difficult to resist the 

 belief that around the Indian Ocean at least, there was a 

 period of severe cold towards the close of the Palaeozoic 

 era. 1 



The speckled sandstone of the Salt Range is succeeded 

 by a great thickness of deposit, mostly calcareous, which 

 contains one of the most interesting- faunas of India. Ac- 

 cording to its fossils the upper part of the speckled sand- 

 stone itself must be included in this series. It is the 

 Productus Limestone group 2 of Waagen, and, with his 

 limitations, not a single species passes from it either into the 

 beds below or into the beds above. 



As already remarked, the lower part of the speckled 

 sandstone contains fossils which are for the most part 

 identical with those of the marine Carboniferous of New 

 South Wales. But not one of these passes up into the 

 beds above ; and the fauna of the Productus group shows 

 European rather than Australian affinities. It would lead 

 us too far to attempt the correlation of the various sub- 

 divisions of the group, and it must suffice to say that the 

 lower beds appear to be on the horizon of the upper Car- 

 boniferous or of the Permo-Carboniferous of Russian 

 geologists (Artinsk stage of the Urals, etc.); while the 

 upper beds are probably a little newer than the Permian. 

 The most interesting feature of the whole group is the 

 presence of true ammonites along with Palaeozoicbrachiopods. 



The Productus Limestone group is succeeded by beds 

 with Ceratites, and lithologically these might well belong to 

 the same group. Indeed, originally the two were not 

 distinguished, and the collections which have been made 

 from the Ceratite beds since they were separated, have not 

 yet been examined. A preliminary note upon them, how- 

 ever, has recently been published by Waagen, 3 from which 



1 Waagen. "Die Carbone Eiszeit." Jahb. d. k. k. Geo/. Reichs., 

 xxxvii. (1887), 143. Translated in Rec. Geo/. Surv. India, xxi. (1888), p 

 89. A similar boulder-bed is reported in South America, but on extremely 

 imperfect evidence. 



2 "Salt Range Fossils." Pal. Ind., ser. 13. 

 Rec. Geo/. Surv. India, xxv. (1892), p. 182. 



