THE ISLANDS OF THE BAY OF BENGAL. 37 



any distinct stratification, show a cubical cleavage. The prevailing 

 color is light-grey, only ' single bands are darker colored, others 

 are ferruginous, containing numerous clay-ironstone nodules. The 

 clay is a little calcareous effervescing with acids. In the southern 

 lateral bay also appears between the clay beds a more solid stratum 

 from two to three feet thick, and from its projecting part larger 

 and smaller plates are broken off. On one of these plates I observed 

 the impression of a large species of Fucus {Chondrites Nicoba~ 

 rensis, Hochst ) The strike of the strata is from S. S. E. to N. W. 

 in both bays ; the greatest thickness observable in the strata amounts 

 to 20 or 30 feet. This clay deposit, on the northern coast of Car 

 Nicobar, is characterized as a marine formation by the numerous 

 Foraminifera which it contains, but I did not succeed in finding 

 any recognizable remains of Mollusca, except indistinct and badly 

 preserved bivalves (JPelecypoda). 



" Farther towards the south, the clay beds again sink under 

 the level of the sea, and in their place again appear coral banks, 

 the precipitous coast becoming constantly higher, but at the same 

 time gradually more inaccessible. On this coast the sea has 

 washed out deep hollows, and the coral banks are overlaid by massive 

 banks of a white rock consisting of shell and coral sand, and 

 rather soft on the weathered surface. On the Areca river, in 

 the innermost corner of the bay of Saui, the plateau of about 

 60 feet rapidly terminates with a fault, and the southern shore of 

 the bay only exhibits a flat sandy strand richly overgrown with 

 cocoanut trees, being at the same time thickly populated. Judging 

 from a few lumps in the gravel, which I found on the northern as 

 well as on the southern side, I conclude that there is somewhere 

 in the interior of the island a grey fine-grained sandstone with little 

 flakes of white mica, and also compact limestone in situ. The 

 natives used the sandstone from the gravels for grindstones. 



" Batty Malve is a small rocky island with precipitous shores 

 all round. It rises on the south-eastern and eastern side in two 

 terraces to about 150 feet. On the western and north-western 

 side it runs into a low flat cliff; judging from a distance of two 

 or three nautical miles — we did not come nearer — 'the island is 

 inaccessible. The extreme shore seemed to be covered with grass 

 only ; the interior was a low jungle, the crown of a cocoa-palm being 

 here and there visible at its margin. Only opposite Car Nicobar 

 -ean the island give an impression of a " relatively bare rock," as 

 Steen Bille says. The rocks to be found on the island are most 

 probably the same as those of Car Nicobar. 



" Tillangchong. — Situated opposite Car Nicobar is a narrow 

 mountainous island with precipitous cliffs, stretching from N. "W", 

 towards S. E. ; it consists of two rugged mountain ranges, 

 separated by a depression of only 30 feet in depth. Where, on the 

 S. E. both ranges meet, a deep bay is formed, which, during 

 the north-west monsoon, offers an excellent place for anchorage. 



