310 Mr. H. J. Carter on the Kunher Formation 



beneath, and in this state is compact and cavernous, enclosing 

 portions of the clay in its cavities &c. in which it has been 

 formed ; or as a conglomerate with sandy or gravelly detritus 

 from the igneous rocks, and the remains of small shells, assi- 

 milating it to the sandy beaches [littoral concrete]. Those 

 portions which are scattered throughout the clay are more or 

 less round, like Septaria ; very uniform in structure, and 

 some so pure that they wholly dissolve in nitric acid. They 

 are generally of a blue colour, but sometimes quite white and 

 identical with chalk. Like Septaria^ also, they are irregular 

 and almost invariably envelope the remains of some organic 

 matter, such as pieces of reed, wood, the remnants of crab- 

 shells, &c., which are very frequently removed, and leave 

 nothing but their moulds in the centre of the concretions. 

 This substance also accumulates in the interior of shells and 

 almost always fills the cavities of pholadine tubes which have 

 been formed in the clay. It does not always, however, enve- 

 lope organic remains, but may be seen appended to them in a 

 globular form — to the pincher of a crab-claw, for instance. 

 Occasionally it may be seen, in a vertical section of the clay, 

 in the state of a number of isolated particles or concretionary 

 nuclei round a piece of wood, as if in process of forming a 

 nodule, not by successive layers, but by the increase of sub- 

 stance round different centres." 



As much the same statement is given in my ' Summary of 

 the Geology of India' (1858), I need not repeat it here, nor 

 add more than that the surface of the regur generally is over- 

 spread with the nodules of kunker which have been weathered 

 out of it, and that, in a great many parts of the Southern 

 Mahratta country (according to Lieut. Aytoun, Geol. Papers, 

 op. cit. p. 389), it occurs continuously at the bottom of the 

 regur, in the form of a conglomerate, which he terms " sheet 

 kunker." 



Although remnants of organic matter in the kunker do not 

 appear to have become fossilized generally, yet Captain W. 

 T. Nicholls, formerly of the 24th Regiment, Madras Native 

 Infantry, Avho was a very good and accurate observer, states 

 with reference to some on the black soil, which he discovered 

 in Central India near Narrainpoor, about 17 miles south-east 

 of Saugor, as follows, viz. : — " I found fossils in three spots 

 on the surface of the regur soil. At the first spot, fragments 

 of dicotyledonous wood with a fragment of palm, one frag- 

 ment of fossil bone, and a fossil ? palm-seed, converted into 

 tuffaceous lime [kunker]. At the second spot, fragments of 

 large bones strewed on the surface of the black regur soil, and 

 one or two fragments of fossil wood, together with irregular 



