OF CENTRAL INDIA AND BENGAL. 309 



stone" " boulder clay" «* friable rubbly clay" " boulders of crystalline 

 rocks," &c. 



A few months later, his brother Mr. Jos. Gr. Medlicott, in a brief 

 report on the coal and iron of the Nerbudda (a) speaks of, as the lowest rock 

 of the coal-bearing formation, " a conglomerate of a fine green earthy base 

 " which is slightly calcareous in places, and the pebbles of which are 

 " exclusively derived from old crystalline rocks" — " thick and thin 

 " bedded sandstones which contain bands of pebbles and are alternated 

 " with some beds of greenish micaceous flagstones." Similar conglome- 

 rates are noticed in other places, covered by the " typical coal-bearing 

 sandstones," &c, &c. 



From these details it will be seen, that whenever the rocks associated 

 with coal had been examined, there was found to occur at their base a 

 set of beds of very peculiar mineral character. These had been noticed 

 by Mr. Williams in his examination of the Damoodah and Adji fields and 

 of the Hazareebagh fields, and by several other observers as stated. 

 Mr. Williams had however failed to observe that there existed a dis- 

 tinct unconformity between these lower beds and the beds associated 

 with coal, with which they were in contact ; and in the other localities to 

 which reference has been made above, there either was no possibility 

 of tracing this, in consequence of no newer rocks occurring in super- 

 position on these, as in several places in Bengal, or there appeared to be 

 a local, though not very well marked conformity, as in Central India. 



Such was the state of our information when the Messrs. Blanford 

 (who had only arrived in India a short time previously) proceeded to the 

 district of Cuttack in 1855-56. In the district of Talcheer in the 

 tributary mehals of Orissa, they found a series of rocks, identical in 

 mineral composition, and in lithological character, -with those we have 

 already referred to above, (but with which they were, of course, un- 

 acquainted), and which were described in detail in their valuable report 



(a) Selections from Records of Government of India, No. X., page 18, &c. 



