NERBUDDA DISTRICT. 209 



under this name. In one place (vide Memoirs of Geol. Survey of India, 

 Vol. II, p. 65,) the rocks hitherto so called have proved to belong to 

 very much older series. But disregarding the name for the present, 

 Mr. Hislop states that he considers these uppermost beds under the trap 

 to be of the same age as the sedimentary beds now included between the 

 trap flows. The statement that " paludince along with much silicified 

 wood" occur in these sandstone beds, is of much importance. Mr. Hislop, 

 probably with much justice, refers these " Intertrappean" beds to the 

 lower eocene age, pointing out the analogy with the remarkable fresh- 

 water beds of Rilly in France.(a) 



they have been met with and their " intertrappean" position actually traced, is remarkable 

 From this prevalent mineral character, the nature of some of these Nagpur deposits is very 

 widely divergent. And taking into account the fact that these beds have not been actually 

 traced into position, that their mineral character is remarkably similar to that of beds in 

 the same immediate vicinity which contain fossils of a very much older geological series, 

 I would suggest the consideration of whether some of these freshwater remains may not here- 

 after prove to be of much earlier date, and even to belong to about the epoch of the 

 Wealden. 



It is worthy of notice, that in Bengal, in the Rajmahal hills, there are intercalations 

 of beds of clay and sand between trap flows, which beds, in that district, contain abundant 

 remains of plants very beautifully preserved, but which have as yet yielded no trace of animal 

 remains with the exception of a single elytron of a beetle, (Buprestidse ?) The evidence of 

 fossil plants is at best imperfect, but the whole group of these remains points to an upper 

 Mesozoic Epoch, and there is a strong general resemblance to the Wealden flora of Europe, 

 with at the same time, some very anomalous occurences of forms, and even of genera, only 

 hitherto known in rocks of much older date. The full details of these facts are now in 

 preparation for the press. Can then, these intertrappean beds of Bengal represent the 

 same epoch as some at least of the intertrappean beds of Western and Central India. And 

 is it not possible that the beds at some of the localities mentioned above and which have 



(a) Mem. Geol. Soc. de France, Vol. Ill, 2 Ser. p. 257. The same eocene age was 

 long since suggested as the most probable epoch for these upper, or as we have called 

 them " Mahadeva" rocks.— Mem. Geol. Survey of India, Vol. I, p. 171. Indeed, the ana- 

 logy of the "Intertrappean" beds of Central India with the beds at Rilly was, we believe, 

 first pointed out to Mr. Hislop by the Survey, 



P 



