744 
inhabited by Baschkirs, is infinitely more picturesque than the North 
Ural; but, with the exception of the environs of Miask and Zlata- 
oust, it is much less rich in mines than the North Ural. 
Geological Structure—The Ural mountains consist of ancient se- 
dimentary strata, which, in the central parts of the chain and on its 
eastern or Siberian flank, are for the most part in a highly metamor- 
phic condition; also of various rocks of igneous or intrusive origin. 
Owing to the eruption of the latter at numberless points and 
along great zones of fissure parallel to the axis of the chain, the 
ancient deposits are so dismembered and altered, that it is at inter- 
vals only they can be deciphered. _ The rocks are described in de- 
scending order, or from the flanks to the centre of the chain. 
Carboniferous System.—By examining these mountains from their 
western slopes, where igneous rocks are comparatively scarce, the 
authors, in consequence of their knowledge of the palzozcic strata 
of western Europe and Russia in Europe, had no great difficulty in. 
reading off the true order of succession on the banks of the Tchus- 
sovaya, Serebrianka, and other transversely-flowing streams. In 
the first place, the beds of sandstone, conglomerate and calcareous 
flags alluded to in the former memoir* are seen to rise from beneath 
the Permian deposits, and containing in some parts thin courses of 
coal, and in others coal-plants, Goniatites and certain fossils, re- 
present the upper members of the carboniferous system. These 
strata are succeeded by a thick formation of hard quartzose grit 
and sandstone, very much resembling the millstone grit of some 
parts of England. Beneath this is the carboniferous or mountain 
limestone, properly so called, of English geologists, and which is 
recognised by containing many of the same typical fossils as in En- 
gland and other parts of Russia. Thus defined, the carboniferous 
system occupies, on the western side of the chain, a very wide zone, 
which to the south of Kongur is expanded into a large trough ex- 
tending beyond the parallel of 55° N. lat., and flanked upon the 
west and east by upcasts of the limestone, it contains in its centre the 
great undulations of the grits and conglomerates just spoken of. 
A third and less prolonged, but most remarkable zone of this 
limestone appears in four insulated hills extending north and south 
of Sterlitamak, and perfectly parallel to the chain. It is in the 
southern prolongation of this line of upheaval that the Permian red 
sandstones and limestones of Gre-beni and Orenburg are thrown 
into anticlinal positions, the axis of which is also parallel to that of 
the adjacent older rocks... For reasons hereafter adduced, it is in- 
ferred that this anticlinal was formed subsequent to the chief ele- 
vation of the chain. 
Devonian Limestones, &c.—The Devonian rocks of the North Ural 
are seen on the banks of the Tchussovaya in the form of limestones, 
grits and schists, which pass into the lower carboniferous limestone, 
the latter being always in highly inclined, sometimes in very con- 
torted and even inverted positions, the younger rocks dipping under 
the older. These Devonian limestones much resemble, in their dark 
* Seeanté, p. 723. 
