12 BLANFOltD : GEOLOGY OF WESTERN SIND. 



The third principal contribution to our knowledge of Sind geology, 

 ffArchiac and Haime, although purely palseontological, far exceeds in 

 1853 - importance any of the others. It is contained in 



Messrs. D'Arehiac and Haime's Description des animaux fossiles du 

 groupe nimmulitique de I'Inde, published at Paris in 1853. It is not 

 too much to say that this work exceeds in value and importance any 

 other on Indian palaeontology ever published in Europe, and it is 

 scarcely necessary to add that up to the date of its publication nothing 

 approaching Messrs. D'Archiac and Haime's work in amount of informa- 

 tion and thoroughness had appeared in India. The authors brought to 

 the work an extensive knowledge of European tertiary fossils, and the 

 superb plates of figures, amongst which most of the common fossils of 

 the Sind lower tertiaries were represented, have ever since been of the 

 greatest service to all geologists engaged in investigating the tertiary 

 rocks of India. Nevertheless, several of the conclusions drawn from the 

 imperfect knowledge of the rocks then available have since required 

 modification, and in one respect at least, in classing all the marine fossils 

 from Sind and Cutch as lower tertiary, and in overlooking the presence 

 of a large miocene fauna, the authors fell into an error which has largely 

 affected subsequent researches. 



Messrs. D'Archiac and Haime's work is too well known to require 

 detailed description. All that is necessary here is to review those parts of 

 it especially relating to Sind. The book is divided into two parts — the 

 first consisting of a monograph of the genus Nummulites extending to 164 

 quarto pages, with eleven plates, and the second of the description of 

 Indian nummulitic fossils (pages 165 — 373 and Plates XII — XXXVI). 

 The first part is general, and of the species of nummulites described the 

 majority have not been found in India ; it is with the second part that we 

 are especially concerned. This commences with a 'Resume Geologiqtie, 1 

 containing a very full summary of all that had been written by Indian 

 observers, up to the date of publication, on the geology of the Indian 



1 The 'Resume in question is chiefly taken from D'Archiac's Ristoire des progres de la 

 Geologie, Vol. iii, page 195. 



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