Chap. II.] the Himalayan series. 29 



beds of the Solun watershed, and elsewhere. We are thus compelled to 

 admit its local removal in such cases. Weathering is almost the only cause 

 I can suggest, though it seems inadequate to account for all the facts. 

 The most concentrated form in which this carbonaceous matter occurs 



is as a fault-rock, or where great crushing has 

 In faults. 



taken place.* In such positions it is of very com- 

 mon, almost general, occurrence throughout the Lower Himalaya, being 

 found in fault ground among schist-rocks even far away in the interior. 

 The fact of the very general occurrence of this carbonaceous matter in 

 this position, in fissures and in lines of crushed rock, in greater proportion 

 than anywhere else, and also in places far removed from where there 

 is any appearance of the black slates, may, with reason, be thought to 

 invalidate the opinion I have expressed as to its origin in those slates ; 

 it certainly leaves that opinion conjectural. That the two phenomena are 

 connected seems probable. 



The Infra-Krol beds consist of an uncertain, but considerable, thick- 

 ness of thin-bedded gritty slates, normally carbo- 

 Infra-Krol beds. 



naceous. Among these there occurs occasionally 



a thicker bed of fine sandstone, generally brown and iron-stained. There 

 are also, but more rarely, lenticular layers of limestone. Just at the rise 

 to the Boj, from the Solun watershed, there is an instance of the latter 

 kind that has puzzled me a good deal ; if original in the slates it must 

 be very discontinuous, as it does not show again in many good sections 



* Some little interest was excited about a year ago in these provinces about a rock of this 

 kind in the neighbourhood of Subathu. Some discoverers, more ardent than wise insisted 

 that it was coal. There is some excuse for such a mistake being made from a superficial 

 inspection of the matter itself. It has a brilliant jet-black colour, and is even slightly bitu- 

 minous. Some of this supposed coal, of which I made a rough assay, gave as much as twenty- 

 five per cent, of fixed carbon, ten per cent, of volatile matter, with sixty-five per cent, of ash- 

 The greater portion of the ten per cent, driven off as volatile consisted of sulphurous fumes 

 a small proportion being combustible hydro-carbons. The ash is impalpable earth. Besides 

 even in hand specimens, this pseudo-coal always betrays its condition, being a flaky mass, break- 

 ing up into scales, like micaceous iron-ore, which it sometimes almost rivals in brilliancy. 



