512 



BUEYING OF FOSSILS IN 



[Ch. XLV. 



In districts repeatedly deranged by earthquakes rivers often 

 shift their channels from one part of a valley to another, 

 and alluvial accumnlations caused by transient floods become 

 permanent depositaries of organic substances. 



Ma7 



May 



eram 



)f Coromandel 

 from the NE., 



mile 



the shore, swept 



many 



drowned 



marine 



on which the carcasses of about 100^000 head of cattle were 

 strewed. An old tradition of the natives of a similar flood, 

 said to have happened about a century before^ was, till this 

 event, reo-arded as fabulous by the European settlers.^ The 



was, so late as May, 1832, the 



same 



coast 



Coromandel 



scene of another catastrophe of the same kind ; and when 

 the inundation subsided, several vessels were seen grounded 

 in the fields of the low country about Coringa. 



Many of the storms termed hurricanes have evidently been 

 connected with submarine earthquakes, as shown by the 

 atmospheric phenomena attendant on them, and by the 

 sounds heard in the ground and the odours emitted. 



Houses and ivorJcs of art in alluvia 

 subterranean town, anparentlv of 



%rt in alluvial dej^osits, — A very ancient 

 _3parently of Hindoo origin, was dis- 

 covered in India in 1833, in digging the Doab canal. Its 

 site is north of Saharunpore, near the town of Behat, 

 and 17 feet below the present surface of the country. 



coins of silver and copper were found, and 



5 



earthenware. The overlying 

 feet of river sand, with a 



More than 170 



many articles in metal an^ 



deposit consisted of about 



substratum, about 12 feet thick, of red alluvial clay. In 



the neighbourhood are several rivers and torrents, which 



descend from the mountains charged with vast quantities 



of mud, sand, and shingle ; and within the memory of persons 



now living the modern Behat has been threatened by an 



inundation, which, after retreating, left the neighbouring 



* Doclsley's Ann. Eegist., 1788 



1 





I 



