6 MALLET, VINDHYAN SERIES. 



question,^ showing- the inconclusiveness of the evidence adduced, which 

 he sums up as follows : 1st, that the formation includes a number of beds 

 of variegated marls and grits ; 2ndly, that it is quarried for architectural 

 purposes ; Srdly, that it is saliferous ; 4thly, that it is horizontally strati- 

 fied ; 5thly, that it is unconformably stratified. In his reply he shows 

 that variegated marls and grits occui- in the oU as well as in the new 

 red-sandstone of England ; that with regard to the second reason, the 

 assertion will equally apply to most of the sandstone of the coal formation, 

 as well as of the old-red-sandstone ; that there is no direct evidence of the 

 existence of salt in the Vindhyans,t and that the horizontal and uncon- 

 formable stratification of the new-red-sandstone in England is a circum- 

 stance peculiar to that country, which need not, and does not always, 

 obtain elsewhere. Mr. Everest fui-ther doubts Franklin's identification of 

 the Nagode limestone with the lias, his reason being the absence of 

 shells, which abound in the latter. He conjectures correctly that we 

 ouo>ht to assign to the Vindhyans an earlier place than the new-i^ed, 

 thouo"h he is less fortunate in his reasons for this opinion. He regards 

 all the coal-fields between the Sone and Hooghly as outliers of the 

 Vindhyans, since " we have reason to believe that the Bundelkund forma- 

 tion contains coal," and he appears to assume that the Indian coal must 

 necessarily be of carboniferous age. We know now that the Damuda 

 coal-fields belong to an epoch quite distinct from, and more recent than, the 

 Vindhyans, which latter contain no coal. Neither do they pre'sent " frequent 

 passages into granite or gneiss," although altered locally into quartzite, 

 Mr. Conybeare, in his report on geologyj to the British Association, 

 1832, Rev. W.D. Cony- gi^^s, when referring to India, an abstract of the 

 beare. information then possessed regarding, the Vin- 



dhyan rocks, which, amongst many accurate statements, contains several 



* Gleanings of Science, Vol. Ill, p. 207. 



f The name Vindbyan is used here and in other places to avoid circumlocution, 

 although it was first applied to the series only in 1856 by Dr. Oldham. 

 % Second report of the British Association, p. 395. 



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