SON PLATEAU. 203- 



1,000 feet thick^ but its upper and lower limits are not sharply defined, 

 and the orange and grey overlying rocks must be enormously thick;, 

 extending far into the Potwar with northerly inclinations. 



The nummulitic limestone has everywhere the same aspect, the 



same prominent light colour, compact and some- 

 Nummulitic. . i i • 



times cherty texture above, but is always nodular 



and lumpy below ; soft and marly between the nodules, and of a warm 



yellowish colour. Its fossils also are still the imperfect casts of bivalves, 



large Gastropods, and Echinoderms and Nummulites throughout. It 



extends everywhere over the northern half of the plateau with a most 



irregular southern boundary, and occurs also as outlying masses. 



The increased contortion of the beds in this portion of the range 

 becomes apparent even on the plateau, where the nummulitic beds 

 roll along numerous east and west anticlinal axes, in bold, open or closer 

 curves, which very generally coincide with the features of the ground;^ 

 and sometimes form considerable hills. 



The country which exhibits most of this north and south compression 

 is that around Sodhi. Along the valley of the Nursingphoar river and 

 to the south, for some distance, a long rugged hilly strip of nummulitic 

 rocks similarly contorted stretches from this Sodhi vicinity towards 

 Sakesar, roughly dividing the .plateau into nearly equal parts ; while on 

 the northern side of the table-land the limestone beds roll up in a great 

 wave, some two miles wide, and then turning over to the northward^ 

 rapidly disappear beneath the sandstone series. 



The southern edge of the nummulitic limestone usually forms a 

 bold escarpment with a gentle northerly inclination for some distance, 

 and, unlike the Nurpur plateau, the northern side of this Son plateau is 

 rather lower than the south, as a general rule. Numerous large and 

 small outliers of the nummulitic rocks, frequently connected with dislo- 

 cation, are to be found beyond its general southern escarpment, which 

 maintains a very irregularly indented east and west direction. 



( 203 ) 



