Correspondence — R. Bruce Fooie, C. E. De Ranee. 187 



DISCOVERY OF PEEHISTORIC REMAINS IN INDIA. 



(Extract of letter from R. Bruce Foote, Esq., F.G,S,, of tke Geological Survey 

 of India.) 



" You will be interested to hear of a prehistoric discovery lately 

 made by a friend of mine (a Mr. Fraser, a civil engineer in Grovern- 

 ment employ) near Bellary, namely, of large numbers of celts, 

 rubbing-stones, and pounders, under such circumstances as to leave 

 no doubt that the hills in which they occur were occupied by the 

 manufacturers, who have left numerous very considerable kitchen- 

 middens behind them, resting on rude terraces constructed among 

 the immense tors and blocks of granite gneiss of which the hills 

 consist. 



Their surface-inspection yielded large numbers of the implements 

 and flakes innumerable ; the middens themselves ought therefore to 

 be extremely good hunting-ground when they come to be carefully 

 excavated, as I trust they will before very long. 



The celts are in all stages, from the rudest and most palgeolithic 

 chipped implement to the completely polished type. The majority 

 are, I think, only polished in part, at the edge. Nearly all are 

 made of Greenstone, which does not occur within several miles of 

 one locality discovered by Mr, Eraser, but a large dyke of which 

 traverses the other. 



Of the rubbing- stones most are made of granitic rock, many of a 

 variety totally different from that forming the hill-range. 



The round pounding-stones are mostly made of Greenstone, 



I had the good luck to discover a third settlement a few days after 

 Mr. Fraser had shown me the two localities he had found. Mine is 

 some 15 or 16 miles west of Bellary. It is a large conical mound, 

 consisting chiefly of soft yellowish slag, in layers, intei'stratified 

 with the midden-stuff, as shown by many little rain -sections. By-the- 

 bye it has been described somewhere already as a volcanic ash-cone ! 



Being on the march, and the place a very long way from my next 

 stage, I could only devote a very brief space of time to it, but, in a 

 few minutes, I had obtained a polished celt, some pounders, and 

 rubbing-stones, not to mention flakes. One pounder is made of very 

 hard rich red heematite. The celt is of Greenstone ; it has been 

 burnt. The settlement was very likely burned down at several 

 intervals — an occurrence not rare at the present day in poor villages, 

 where the huts are very largely built of the coarse stiff straw of 

 the Holcus Sorghum." 



We hope to hear further particulars of this very interesting dis- 

 covery from Mr, Bruce Foote. — Ebit, Gkol. Mag. 



THE CTCLAS CLAY OF WEST LANCASHIRE. 

 SiK, — In your last Number, Mr. T. M. Reade denies the existence 

 of a fresh-water clay underlying the peat of the West Lancashire 

 lowland plain, and seems to be under the impression that I never 

 recognized the existence of a Lower Scrobicularia Clay, occupying a 

 similar position, until the appearance of his papers, and appears to 

 suggest that I should adopt his names of " Washed-Drift Sand " and 



