OP WESTERN AND CENTRAL INDIA. 21 



intertrappeans and those of the plastic clay found at Rilly la Montagne, 

 in Belgium, several points of similarity between the flora of the intertrap- 

 peansj and that of the London clay, and, especially, close resemblances 

 between mollusca of the nummulitics of N. "W. India and those found 

 at the localities already mentioned near Rajamundry. 



It will be seen that the evidence, although strong, is imperfect. 

 Similarity of specific forms may imply, not identity, but merely approxi- 

 mation of geological age. That which I have to notice, therefore, will 

 not in the least afiect Mr. Hislop's argmnents, but will tend, I think, 

 to favor the idea that the traps may be rather older than lower eocene. 



It has for some time been known that marine fossiliferous rocks 

 of cretaceous age exist in the western part of the Nerbudda Valley. The 

 fossils were first discovered near Bagh by Lieutenant (now Colonel) 

 Keatinge in 1856, and briefly described by Dr. Oldham in the Journal 

 of the Asiatic Society of Bengal for 1858, Vol. XXVII, p. 123, and 

 by Dr. Carter in the Journal of the Bombay Branch Royal Asiatic 

 Society, Vol. V, p. 621. Some of the same collection of fossils, amongst 

 which. Echinodermata prevailed largely, furnished the material for a 

 recent paper by Dr. Martin Duncan,"^ in which the exact horizon 

 of the Bagh beds was shown to be that of the Upper Greensand 

 of Europe.f 



In 1861 Mr. Rogers, the Collector of Surat, found nummulitic 

 limestone in situ at Turkesur, close to Surat. The occurrence of lime- 

 stone containing nummulites had previously been noted, a few miles 

 further north, by Dr. Malcolmson and Major FuUjames, but the details 



* Quar. Jour. Geol. Soc. of London, Vol. XXI, p. 349. 



t There are some minor errors regarding localities in Dr. Martin Duncan's paper 

 to which I shall refer elsewhere. I scarcely think, too, that all his geological conclusions 

 are home out hy the evidence adduced, but there can be no question of the Bagh beds 

 being middle cretaceous. 



( 157 ) 



