Geology of the BImrlpoor iJistrkt. 329 



t£iugflit ihefn by the fall of their far-famed capital in 1825, has 

 not been thrown away upon the inhabitants ; and in no part of 

 India does the English traveller meet with more civility and at^. 

 tention than \t\ this district, where a few years ago he was treated 

 with insult and contempt. 



^^'The rocks which immediately underlie the Gangetic deposits 

 in some few situations, appear near the surface, and are quarried 

 for architectural purposes ; while strata of an anterior date to 

 these here and there crop out, forming, especially in the northern 

 portion, small detached hills, which are generally topped by a 

 village or stronghold. To the west the Bhurtpoor district is 

 flanked by a belt of rocks of the secondary class, which stretches 

 in a north-easterly direction from the ancient city of Biana, 

 situated on the south-western portion of the district. This belt 

 is interposed between the newer strata just alluded to, and the 

 decidedly primary formations of the Jeypoor and Ajmeer terri- 

 tories : its eastern limit is marked by a low hill range, seen a short 

 distance to the westward of the city of Bhurtpoor. 



The sandstone quarries which have for centuries supplied all 

 this portion of India with materials for building, are situated in 

 the Bhurtpoor district, and, as these are important, both in a 

 statistical and geological point of view, I shall, in the first place, 

 communicate what little information I have been enabled to 

 collect relative to their natural history. 



Of the sandstones there are three varieties. No. 1. is a close- 

 grained argillaceous sandstone, more or less slaty; of a uniform 

 dark red colour, so soft as to be scratched by the knife, and ap- 

 parently composed of small particles of quartz, cemented toge- 

 ther by a ferrugino-argillaceous basis : minute scales of mica are 

 distributed through the mass, to which circumstance it appa^ 

 rently owes its slaty texture. No. 2. is also a close-grained ar- 

 gillaceous sandstone. This is a very beautiful variety, its co- 

 lour is dark red, speckled with white spots, which are generally 

 roundish, and vary from an inch in diameter to the size of a 

 pin'*s head. This rock is less schistose than No. 1, contains less 

 mica, and, when slabs of it are properly cut and squared, has, 

 at a little distance, exactly the appearance of a fine red por- 

 phyry. No. 3. is a rock similar in point of texture and compo- 

 sition to the last, but is of a uniform salmon-colour, passing into 



