THE TRANSITION SERIES. 51 



and has been worked extensively for buildings, both in the immediate 

 neighbourhood and at some distance. I believe almost all the materials 

 of the new pagoda at Nellore were quarried here. Much further west 

 also, near the ghats in the neighbourhood of Bijjampalle, there is a con- 

 siderable extent of granitoid gneiss (well adapted for building stone) 

 forming hills of some size. Here, however, and also further south near 

 Govindapully, where it also occurs, but in smaller quantity, it has been 

 but little utilised. 



" More schistose varieties of the gneissic rocks are much more large- 

 ly k developed, and hornblende schists, mica schists, and talcose schists 

 form the greatly preponderating portion of the rocks of this part of the 

 district, garnetiferous hornblende schists being largely abundant. From 

 these, however, I did not succeed in obtaining any crystals of garnets at 

 all so good as some from the more southerly parts of the district, e.g., 

 near Chittaloor, Thooroomulla, &c, from which places we procured 

 numerous excellent crystals of various sizes from 1 inch and more in 

 diameter to | inch. In the north-western parts of the area under notice 

 micaceous and talcose schists prevail largely, frequently much contorted 

 and often very slaty and earthy in character, and sometimes closely re- 

 sembling some talcose slates in the ' Cuddapah series/ Indeed, in 

 places the resemblance is so great that hand specimens of each could 

 rarely be distinguished one from the other, and in some cases, where the 

 more slaty beds of this Cuddapah series overlie these similar beds of the 

 older metamorphic rocks, it becomes difficult to fix the line of boundary- 

 bet ween them, specially when, as is sometimes the case, the strike is 

 almost or quite identical, and owing to the contortions (of the lowest beds 

 specially) the dip becomes so locally ; and the similarity is great, not only 

 between the talcose schists or slates of either series, but also between 

 the quartz-rock or intensely quartzose gneiss of the one or the quartzite 

 of the other. A case in point occurs in the hill east of Bomaram (Bom- 

 maveram), the lower part of which consists of hornblende schists, gneiss, 

 and quartz-rock in alternating bands, striking about north-north-west 

 and having a general dip to east-north-east at various angles, the beds 

 rolling much, while the hill is capped by quartzite of the Cuddapah 



( 159 ) 



