BIOGEAPIIICAL SKETCH. XXXI 



ascending the Jumnootree as far as the hot springs at the 

 sources of the Jumna. His diary kept during this journey 

 is full of interest. He dwelt with much force on the singular 

 contrast to the Alps of Switzerland, or the Highlands of 

 Scotland, presented by the Himalayahs in the absence of 

 lakes, ^ — a fact which many years afterwards he handled with 

 his wonted vigour in the discussion upon the Glacier-Erosion 

 theory of lake-basins. Between Mussooree and Deobun he 

 discovered greenstone trap. He also described a section of 

 the bed of the Jumna at Burkot, which he believed to 

 possess great interest in connection with the Sewalik Hill 

 formation. It consisted of schistose primitive rocks with a 

 superimposed layer of unstratified gravel, forming a cliff 

 upwards of 50 feet above the level of the river, and exactly 

 like that found in the Kheeri and Kalowala passes. It 

 appeared to Dr. Falconer that this was due to • ' a diluvial 

 action higher up the valley, perhaps the sudden disruption 

 of a large volume of water, forming a mighty wave which 

 swept along suspended in it an enormous quantity of gravel 

 and left it deposited as at Burkot, at intervals in its course, 

 where the velocity of the stream might have diminished, and 

 which rushed on to the plains, where, disemboguing from its 

 contracted channel, it spread out and left the gravel deposit 

 now crowning the Sewalik Hill formation, previous to their 

 upheaval.' 



A letter written to the Rev. Dr. Gordon of Birnie, N.B., 

 soon after his rettirn from the Jumnootree, contains the fol- 

 lowing paragraph : — 



' The rock formations of the Himalayahs are all primary : the Sub- 

 Himalayan is very recent. In the outer ridges jou get limestone and 

 the newer primary rocks (transition). As you go on, gneiss, mica- 

 slate, &c. succeed. In the outer ridges the volcanic rocks are greenstone 

 traps (I believe I was the first to make this out), often with porphy- 

 ritic crystals, and here and there unstratified quartz rock. As you go 

 inwards you get granite and syenite. On the southern side of the snow 

 peaks there are more recent formations, and I should not have said that 

 the Himalayahs are entirely primary. You there get limestone with 

 Ammonites, Orthocerates, Trilobifes, and Terehratulce, as in the moun- 

 tain limestone of England. The snowy range or central ridge has an 



' 'Lakes are scarcely anywhere seen 

 in the Himalayahs. This singiihir fea- 

 ture strikes any one who has seen the 



■Highlands of Scotland or travelled in the 

 Alps,' &c. 



