B. Bullen Newton — Marine Fossils from Mekran Coast. 297 



to refer briefly to the remaining literature wliicli treats of the 

 Tertiary invertebrates of other parts of India. 



One of the earliest papers is that by James de Carle Sowerby/ 

 who determined Capt. Grant's Tertiary collections from Cutch as 

 belonging to Nummulitic and later Tertiary horizons ; this was 

 succeeded in 1853 by D'Archiac & Haime's memoir^ on the 

 Nummulitic fossils of India, which unfortunately is not a reliable 

 work, since Secondary and Tertiary specimens are mixed up together 

 and regarded as coming from the same series of beds. 



Then followed Stoliczka's^ work on the Tertiary Crabs of Sind 

 and Cutch ; Duncan's * on the Fossil Corals of Sind ; the Tertiary 

 Echinoids of Western Sind being monographed by Duncan & 

 Sladen^ between 1882 and 1886; lastly, we have the very 

 important treatise on the Miocene Fauna of Burma written by 

 Dr. Fritz Noetling,** containing a large number of plates illus- 

 trative of the fossils (chiefly MoUusca) of that region, accompanied 

 by a voluminous text. 



In describing this fauna Dr. Noetling was able to trace, in 

 a general way, its correlation with the Miocene of Java and the 

 Miocene (Gajian) of Western India. He believed also that the 

 present Indian Ocean fauna was directly derived from the Miocene 

 faunas of India, Burma, Sumatra, and Java. Until more is known 

 of the Tertiary Mollusca of Western India and its connection with 

 the shells now living in the surrounding seas it would be premature 

 to definitely state the age of the Mekran nodules, although we 

 may assume, provisionally, that they are Pliocene and probably 

 synchronous with the beds of the ' Mekran Group,' which 

 Dr. Blanford first recognized as younger than either the Eocene 

 or the Miocene periods. In support of this horizon we have the 

 undoubted presence of a northern genus, Neptunea, associated with 

 forms that belong to a torrid or warmer sea, an exactly similar 

 phenomenon being known in the Pliocene beds of Europe, and that 

 without any apparent disturbance of the deposits containing them. 

 Further, in comparing this limited fauna of the Mekran nodules 

 with either the Burmese Miocene fossils described by F. Noetling, 

 or the specimens monographed by Dr. K. Martin from the Upper 

 Tertiary beds of Java, there is insufficient evidence to prove a simi- 

 larity in facies so as to suggest its correlation with the faunas of 

 those two sets of deposits. 



It would have been interesting to have compared the fossils of 

 the present collection with the original specimens of the so-called 



1 Appendix to Capt. Grant's " Memoir to illustrate a Geological Map of 

 Cutch" : Trans. Geol. Soc. Loudon, 1840, ser. ii, vol. v, pp. 289-329, pis. xxiv-xxvi. 



^ " Description des Animaux Fossiles du Group Nummulitique de I'Inde," 1853- 

 1854, 2 vols., plates and text. 



^ "Observations on Fossil Crabs from Tertiary Deposits in Sind and Kutch": 

 Mem. Soc. Geol. India, Pal. Indica, 1871, pp. 16, pis. v. 



* " Sind Fossil Corals and Alcyonaria" : ibid., 1880, pp. 110, pis. xxviii. 



5 " Tertiary Echinoidea of "Western Sind " : ibid., 1882-1886, text and plates. 



^ "Fauna of the Miocene Beds of Burma": ibid., new series, 1901, vol. i, 

 pp. 378, pis. XXV. 



