GENERAL DESCRIPTION-. 



The frequent occurrence of the products of felspathic decomposition 

 offers sources for the extraction of salt, soda, and saltpetre, and for the 

 manufacture of bangle glass; but these operations are really only spasmodic, 

 natives, as a rule, seldom manufacturing more than is sufficient for local 

 use. The extraction of salt from the lagoon waters is, on the other hand, 

 an extensive and profitable industry, and this is nearly altogether in the 

 ( hands of Government. There are good indications of fairly rich copper 

 ores on the northern edge of the field, but in spite of many costly 

 attempts which have been made within the last fifty years to work them, 

 the results have hitherto been ruinous. 



Iron has never been extensively smelted, only a few furnaces being 

 worked at all regularly, though there is a strong run of iron beds in the 

 southern part of the field. Diamonds are said to have been found, but 

 reliable information could never be obtained on this point, neither were 

 any traces of old workings ever met with. There is 5 however, a prima 

 facie expectation that those gems should be found near the mouth of the 

 Penner gorge, this being the only funnel through which any debris of 

 the diamond-bearing deposits could be carried from the Cuddapah or 

 K urn ool district, where diamonds are worked, 7 or were formerly found 

 at no great distance up the river. The conclusion is, that if few stones 

 are or were obtained so much higher up the rivers, then fewer, or none 

 at all, could be expected to occur below the gorge. However, there are 

 old diamond workings in the Kistna district, in the north-east prolonga- 

 tion of the Eastern Ghats, which appear to have been in true Cuddapah 

 strata, and not merely in beds of the newer Kurnool rocks, as is more 

 generally the case ; and as the Veligondas are of Cuddapah beds, it may 

 after all be that diamonds have been found to the seaward of these 

 mountains. Other minerals, sometimes of use to the jeweller or lapidary, 

 such as garnets, rock crystal, amethyst, and the pretty blue kyanite, are 

 not unfrequent, but these are never good enough to be of any particular 

 value. Mica is sometimes obtainable in moderately-sized plates large 

 enough to be used for small wall-lights and other decorative purposes. 



1 See Mem. Geol. Surv. of India, Vol. VIII. 



( US ) 



