ANNIVERSARY ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT. IxXXVU 



to our means of making ourselves acquainted with the general geology 

 of Hindostan. The Geological Map of India by Mr. Greenough is 

 a worthy counterpart of his Geological Map of England. We all 

 know the careful and systematic manner in which Mr. Greenough 

 has for a long series of years collected and arranged information 

 respecting the geography, geology, and other kindred branches of 

 knowledge from every portion of the globe ; and many have been the 

 regrets which I have heard uttered, that with such a mass of syste- 

 matically-arranged information as he possesses, greater than that of 

 any other individual, he should not already have enabled us to benefit 

 by its publication in some form or other. Mr. Greenough has at 

 length come forward, and the geological map of India is a splendid 

 proof of the value of his materials, and of his power of making use 

 of them. 



In exhibiting this map before the Geological Section at Liverpool, 

 Mr. Greenough accompanied it with remarks on the different forma- 

 tions which have been observed in various parts of India. All the 

 principal formations 'as known in Europe appear to have been met 

 with in that vast country, from the tertiaries of the Punjaub and the 

 Siwalik Hills, whose interesting fossils were described by Col. Cautley 

 and Dr. Falconer, to the Silurian formation of the Himalaya, which 

 affords many forms of Trilobites, Mollusca, and Zoophytes charac- 

 teristic of the Silurian period, and very similar to those of Europe, 

 though none are probably specifically identical. 



I must also mention some interesting communications received from 

 the Rev. Messrs. Hislop and Hunter, respecting the geology of the 

 neighbourhood of Nagpoor. Communications on this subject had 

 already reached us, partly from Mr. Malcolmson many years ago, and 

 lately from Lieut. Sankey, but the details now furnished are more 

 complete and satisfactory. The basis of the country is gneiss, quartz- 

 rock, mica-schist, and granite, on which reposes a sandstone observed 

 over a great extent of country ; with this are associated in some 

 districts shales and argillaceous sandstones, rich in vegetable remains, 

 the age of which is not yet satisfactorily made out. These are over- 

 laid by trappean rocks, separated into two divisions by an inter- 

 mediate layer of a cherty and argillaceous character, abounding in 

 some places with land and freshwater fossils, amongst which, how- 

 ever, the latter greatly preponderate. This bed is chiefly seen along 

 the escarpments of the trap hills, and has a very extensive range. It 

 has been traced more or less uninterruptedly to a distance of 1050 

 miles in a direct line from Rajmahal to Bombay, and 660 miles from 

 N. to S. to the neighbourhood of Padpangali, near the mouth of the 

 Godavery. It is apparently a lacustrine deposit, but its age has not 

 yet been made out with any degree of certainty, though the flora is 

 supposed to have some resemblance to that of the London Clay. It 

 is almost superfluous to say, how cautious we must be in attempting 

 to assign comparative ages to such distant localities ; a caution which 

 is all the more necessary when it refers to lacustrine deposits, which, 

 being naturally isolated, cannot be expected to afford the same terms 

 of comparison with similar formations at a distance, as we might 



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