NtJEPUR PLATEAU. 



197 



Vasnal. 



At the north-eastern eud of this valley there is abundant evidence of 

 faulting, and the ground is greatly broken. One 

 fracture coinciding with the direction of the valley 

 forms the boundary line between the nummulitic limestone and the tertiary 

 sandstones for a distance of nearly three miles. This fault crosses the 

 mouth of the strange little oval valley of Vasnal, surrounded by high cliffs 

 and broken hills of the nummulitic limestone, and occupied within by a 

 mass of the red salt-marl, through which deep gullies and ravines lead 

 out of the valley, beneath the high and conspicuous limestone peak of 

 Tirwar. At the south-west corner of the valley only are there a few 

 ledges of purple and speckled sandstone seen, linking the marl with its 

 proper associates, and these appear to be, like the marl itself, cut off 

 everywhere around the exposure by faults. 



The whole of the marl seen here is little less than a mile in length, 

 and rather more than a quarter of a mile wide, so 

 that it has an area of about a quarter of a square 

 mile. No good salt beds are known to occur here, but in one place 

 an impure saline portion of the marl is 30 feet thick. A strong fresh 

 stream which traverses the marl, after rain, is said to become saline. 

 Any appearance resembling stratification seen in the salt-marl is 

 nearly horizontal, but the limestone surrounding the marl, though also 

 generally horizontally bedded, is in some places a good deal disturbed. 



Salt marl. 



Timv-ar Fe a-k 



Vajna-l 



OTxX.*f.lXy 1 MlZ* 



Fig. 34. — Section across Visual valley. 

 1. Salt marl. 11. Nummulitic limestone. 12. Tertiary sandstone. 



In one or two spots the debris of some soft shaly beds is seen mixed 

 with some broken portions of the beds above the salt marl, but hardly 



( 197 ) 



