﻿1861.] 



IIISLOP NAGPUR SANDSTONE AND COAL. 



349 



in which that genus abounds : and this comparison of the strata at 

 Kota, first with those at Mangali and then with those near Nagpur, 

 confirms the evidence which I have already adduced of the close re- 

 lation between the Mangali and Nag-pur beds. 



Dr. Bell's shaft, which has furnished me with most of my infor- 

 mation regarding the succession of strata at Kota, ended in a deposit 

 of red clay lying 73 feet below the bituminous shale with Fish-re- 

 mains. Can this be the red clay which is found at Malecft, 30 miles 

 N.N.W. of Kota, to embed coprolites and several forms of Ceratodus 

 teeth, which have been described by Dr. Oldham in a recent publi- 

 cation of the Indian Geological Survey ? 



6. Edjmahdl Hills. — How the upper beds of the Rajmahal Hills 

 stand related to the strata that have engaged our attention, and 

 whether there are any examples of them in the Nagpur province, 

 are questions which meet us here. It is obvious that some interval 

 elapsed between the deposition of the inferior and superior beds at 

 Rajmahal. How great, then, was that interval? To me it appears 

 not to exceed the space of time requisite for a whole formation ; as 

 the floras of the respective periods, though different, are not so di- 

 stinct as to indicate a decided change in the circumstances of their 

 growth. In both we have Tceniojpteris and the Cycadacece, the latter 

 being represented in the lower strata of Bengal by Zamites Buixhva- 

 nensis, and in the higher by several species and genera. The equi- 

 valents of the upper Rajmahal beds have been met with by Mr. 

 H. B. Medlicott, on the Hurd River, a little south of the Narbadda*. 

 This discovery brings the existence of these rocks very near our 

 province, but hitherto they have not been found within its limits. 

 It is possible that some of the vegetable impressions occurring at 

 Kampti, especially one or two species of Tceniopteris, are originally 

 from this source • for most of the fossil plants there are not found 

 in situ, but in blocks dispersed through the coarse iron-banded sand- 

 stone. There can however, I think, be no doubt that the greater 

 portion of these remains are the same as others still in their original 

 position in the laminated sandstone of the neighbourhood ; and even 

 to the hypothesis that the remainder may belong to a younger 

 group of strata, there is this objection, though only of a negative 

 kind, that at Kampti, so far as known, there is a total absence of 

 the Cycadacece which characterize the upper beds of Rajmahal. 



7. Comparison of the Strata and Fossils of Ndgpur, Barkoi and the 

 Mdladewas, Mangali, and Kotd. — Setting, then, this higher series at 

 Rajmahal and the Hurd River in a category by itself, let us endea- 

 vour, by a comparison with formations out of India, to determine 

 the age of the rocks near Nagpur, at Barkoi and the Mahadewas, in 

 "Western Bengal, and at Mangali and Kota, all of which we have seen 

 to be almost, if not altogether, contemporaneous. 



(1.) Fossil Flora of New South Wales. — There are certain deposits 

 in New South Wales which, it must be acknowledged, present ob- 

 vious features of resemblance to the Indian strata under considera- 

 tion. The connexion between those beds in Australia and ours in 

 * Indian Records, x. p. 17. 



