PHYSICAL FEATURES. 47 



outlets, and are all salt or saline, thouo^h far removed from and at a 

 higher elevation than the salt-bearing strata. The largest of them is the 

 Samandar lake, about 3 miles long and 1 wide. The fourth, the 

 lake of Kalar Kahar, having a diameter of about a mile and only a depth 

 of 3 or 4 feet, is situated close under the north side of the range. It 

 has no outlet either except when flooded; a neighbouring nala then 

 affords a passage for the surplus water, and sometimes its white saline 

 bed is all but dry. 



There may be various reasons for the saltness of these lakes, which 

 differs in intensity, and would seem not to be derived from chloride of 

 sodium only; ordinary precipitation from water, unable to escape except by 

 evaporation, may have caused it. In the case of Kalar Kahar, brine 

 springs at one place have an influence ; and with regard to the Son, the 

 saltness may be due to the former existence of overlying sandstones and 

 clays charged with saline ingredients. 



Fresh-water springs are not uncommon upon the plateaux or along 



their borders. Among them may be mentioned 

 Fresh springs. 



those at Choya-Saidan-Shah, the large sacred spring 



of Katas, that at the Wycher cliff, Dand6t, and those of the Verala scarp. 



The table-lands form a large catchment surface, the rain water falling 



upon which would produce springs in the usual way. Another sacred 



spring at Hotas may be connected with dislocation of the rocks. Here 



fresh -water springs are locally numerous, one of them forming a strong 



stream which issues from the dry sandy bed of the Kahan river. 



Brine springs in the salt region are no novelty, but one at Kalra on 

 the south side of the Bakrala ridge near Domeli is 



Brine spring. -i i i • i 



situated among rocks, the highest above the salt- 

 marl ; it also occurs in a dislocated locality in the bed of a torrent 

 depositing calcareous tufa and forming river-conglomerate {Kavjur). 

 The water of the spring is of a milky-bluish opaline tint ; it is half 

 saturated with salt (according to trials by Dr. Warth), and forms black 

 and yellowish precipitates. It comes probably from a considerable depth, 



( 47 ) 



