Chap. 13.] w, blanford, western india. 73 



occurrence, and its distinctness from the more ancient deposit. Frequent- 

 ly intermediate forms occur, which are by no means easy to distinguish. 



Blown Sand. — This is met with along the coast between the mouths 

 of the Nerbudda and Taptee. It presents no peculiarities. 



Black Soil or Eegur. — This is the common soil of the whole of the 



Deccan, Malwa, the Taptee and Nerbudda valleys 

 Cotton Soil or Regui'-. 



and Guzerat. Its peculiar characters have been so 



often described that any thing that can possibly be said about it wiU be a 

 mere recapitulation of what has been said before. It varies greatly in co- 

 lour, in consistence, and in fertility, but preserves the constant characters 

 of being highly argillaceous, somewhat calcareous, of becoming highly 

 adhesive when wetted, (a fact of which any one who has had to traverse 

 a black-soil country after a shower of rain becomes fally aware,) and of 

 expanding and contracting to an unusual extent under the respective in- 

 fluences of moisture and dryness. Hence the great cracks by which it is 

 fissured in the hot weather. Like all argillaceous soils, it retains water, and 

 hence requires less irrigation than more sandy ground. 



In the alluvial flats it passes downwards into the brown calcareous 



^ . , „ . 1 clay : on the uplands it passes similarly down into 



Passage mto alluvial '' . ^ ^ •' 



clay and trap. decomposed trap. It is never of great depth, 



never, except where rearranged by rivers in their recent deposits, met 

 with at any distance below the surface. It is not surprising that a host 

 of observers, from Voysey to Carter, should have contended, and should 

 still contend that it is only disintegrated trap ; over thousands of square 

 miles it is imquestionably derived from decomposed basaltic rocks ; every 

 stage of transition from hard basalt to true regur can be seen in thou- 

 sands of sections. More than this, over enormous areas the boundary 

 of the trap rock below is the boundary of the regur above {a). Nothing 



(a). This is admirably seen throughout the Nagpur and Chanda country. Everywhere 

 on the trap regur recurs ; a few miles to the eastward, upon the metamorphic rocks, it is 

 never seen, except on the surface of alluvial soil brought from the trap country by rivers, 

 such as the Godavery. 



K ( 235 ) 



