176 NERBUDDA DISTRICT. 



§ 6. Upper Damuda. 



It has been already stated that in the Johilla valley the lower Damuda 



beds are seen to have been disturbed, extensively denuded, and to be now 



unconformably overlaid by those to which we have given the name of 



the upper Damuda series. These latter are here made up of clays and 



_ . . „ , earthy sandstones, often massive, but generally 



Description of the up- J ° J 



per Damuda. more or less laminated, generally very soft, but 



occasionally and locally considerably indurated. 



The prevailing colors are lavender grey, and yellowish white, and the 

 _. beds are in some places very fossiliferous. The fos- 



Lower and upper Da- r J 



muda flora distinct. s j| s are a ]} vegetable. The general aspect of these 



plant fossils is very distinct from that of the flora of the lower Damudas ; 

 the vertebraria, glossopteris and phyllotheca of the latter are no longer 

 found, but they are replaced by several cycadeous plants, with some 

 conifers and lycopodites. It cannot as yet be 



To what extent mu- ^ * 



tuaily exclusive. confidently asserted that none of the species of 



the lower group occur in the beds of the upper, but it is certain that the 

 prevalence of certain forms to the exclusion, more or less complete, of 

 others characterizes in a very marked manner each of these series of 

 , , . T deposits.* In Central India the two formations are 



Unconformable in Jo- *■ 



hilla valley. clearly separable on stratigraphical grounds, and 



their unconformity has already been stated to be clearly seen. 



In the Mahanuddi valley this is even better seen ; there the upper 

 Damudas occupy a larger area : better sections of 



Also in the Mahanuddi rj ° 



valley, them are found ; and both the fossils and the li- 



thological characters of the formation can be well studied. 



In the neighbourhood of Jubbulpore beds lithologically identical with 



those of the Mahanuddi are again pretty well ex- 



u por posed. They may be traced along the base of the 



* The collections in the Calcutta Museum do not furnish a single common species. 



