18-fc SUB-HIMALAYAN ROCKS OF N. W. INDIA. [CHAP. VII. 



and one below it of retentive rock, a lower bed was reached, from which 

 pure water rose freely for some feet. The locality was somewhere 

 between Allighur and Agra.* It may be that from a still lower bed the 

 water might rise higher, or even to the surface, — such facts are common 

 in artesian borings. 



The fullest details as regards surface levels may be obtained in 

 Colonel Cautley's great work on the Ganges Canal. I will quote a 

 few figures in illustration of our argument. The upper level of the 

 gravel slopes along the base of the Sivalik hills, between the Ganges 

 and the Jumna, ranges between 300 and 400 feet above the floor 

 of the regulator at the head of the canal, which may be spoken of 

 generally as the Ganges level at Hurdwar. It may then be laid 

 down that no head of water could arise from those gravel beds 

 standing at a higher level than the canal floor at Myapur ; or, to be 

 well within bounds, let us say 100 feet below that level. Meerut 



* I have re-discovered my informant, A. G. Murray, Esq., c. e., of the East Indian Railway, 

 and am glad to he able to add the interesting facts he communicates upon the subject of 

 well water in the Doab. I give an abstract of his letter, dated 5th January 1864 : — The 

 general section of the Doab is — loam, thirty-five feet ; blue silt, thirty feet ; strong clay, twenty 

 feet ; water-bed of reddish sand. All kutcha wells get their water from the blue silt ; it is 

 always more or less saltish, in some places so much so as to prevent agriculture. This blue 

 silt appears to underlie the whole Doab ; it is exactly the same stuff as that found in the bed 

 of the Jumna. The pucka wells are sunk down to the clay, and rest upon it. The upper 

 water-stratum is shut off by short piling puddled ; the water is then drawn off and a -bore- 

 hole, eighteen inches in diameter, is made through the clay, when the water rises very fast 

 and will rest at thirty feet in the well. The clay bed is not horizontal ; it slopes from 

 north to south at about two feet per mile, that of the surface being about eighteen inches 

 per mile. At Toondlah the clay is eighty feet from the surface, and forty miles north of 

 Toondlah it is only sixty feet. The Jumna seems to run in a depression of the clay bed, 

 and this may explain why good wells are scarce near the river, people are afraid of the 

 expense. For instance, at Agra as good water is to be had as anywhere else by sinking to 

 the proper depth. Just south of Allyghur the water bed takes a rapid rise, that I cannot 

 explain : at Allyghur it is but fifteen feet from the surface, while nine miles to the south it 

 stands at thirty feet. The supply of water in these pucka wells is apparently unlimited. 

 For six months thousands of these wells are worked all over the countiy, yet without 

 affecting the supply. I do not see where it can come from except from the hills, and I 

 still believe that an artesian well is quite possible in the Doab ; if the Government would 

 make the experiment it might prove a great public benefit. — Jan. 15, 18G4. 



