o HUGHES: WARDHA VALLEY COAL-FIELD. 



spinners and weavers of coarse cloth in the country, and they furnish 

 most of the ' kotwals ' for the village. They are poor-spirited and tract- 

 able as yet, and consequently present plastic material for shaping into 

 miners. 



The Gonds are somewhat more independent and less pliant, but 

 Gonds. they are physically better adapted for severe 



labor. 



Section III. — Geological Formations. 



Classifying the surface soils and rocks of the Wardha valley in de- 

 scending order, we have — 



1. Recent deposits. 



2. Laterite. 



3. Trappean series. 



4. Lameta, or. infra-trappean group. 



5. Kota-Malc'ri group, "j 



6. Kamthi group. I _ > 



f Gondwana series. 



7. Barakar group. 



8. Talchir group. J 



9. Vindhyan series. 

 10. Metamorphic series. 



In this list, the old and familiar title of Damuda, as a serial denomi- 

 nation, does not occur. The term Damuda series, 

 it will be remembered, embraced the Barakar, the 

 Ironstone shales, and the Bdniganj groups, and it assisted to mark off collec- 

 tively the rocks in which the oldest coal measures occurred in the Damuda 

 valley. More recent researches of geologists and palaeontologists have, 

 however, shewn modifications in the lithological and penological charac- 

 ters of these groups as they were traced beyond the area in which they 

 were first determined. The less well-defined lines of demarcation 

 between them, and the closer relationship that their fossil remains 

 ( 8 ) 



