HUTAR FIELD : TALCIIIR GROUP. 93 



Towards the base the shales are traversed by a strong" dyke of trap 



which in the river section is nearly 50 yards 

 Trap dyke. _ . , 



wide. Close to the top of the section there is a 



boulder bed, in which there are polished granite boulders up to 2 feet 



in diameter ; besides which there are well rounded masses of a dense 



Boulders of Vindhyan red quartzite, which are apparently litholog-ieally 



identical with a well known form of Vindhyan 



rock. In Sirguja I met with a similar deposit,* where, since there 



are no Vindhyan rocks within the present existing watershed, it 



seemed to be necessary to invoke the agency of ice, as affording the 



only possible means of transport from the Sone valley. It should 



be stated that there are Vindhyan quartzites of precisely similar 



character in the Mahanadi valley, but owing to the nature of the 



intervening country in each case, it is perhaps more likely that the 



boulders were carried from the Sone. 



Similarly here, the Vindhyan rocks, though nearer, occur north- 

 wards, in which direction the present lines of drainage run. The sup- 

 posed upheaval of the Palamow highlands, which is elsewhere discussed, 

 would help in this case to support the view, that the boulders may 

 have been transported southwards from the Sone valley by rivers running 

 in an exactly opposite direction to the drainage system at present 

 existing ; but that such a fall to the south ever existed is scarcely 

 likely, and in the Sirguja case most improbable. It may be urged, 

 on the other hand, that Vindhyan rocks possibly existed in siitt in both 

 localities during the Talchir period, and were subsequently completely 

 denuded away. In reply, it can only be said that there is not a particle 

 of evidence to justify such an assumption. 



I am anxious to give some prominence to these remarkable cases. 

 Since, subsequently to the publication of the Sirguja instance, an early 

 opinion of mine^ as to the possible origin of the boulder bed has been 



a Records, 1873. Vol. VI page 28, note. 



b Memoirs, Geological Survey of India, Vol, vi, p. 116. 



( 93 ) 



