GEOLOGY. 35 



constantly present along the whole of the Salt Range itself; the salt 

 series at its base being one of the most constant, and therefore that the 

 absence of many divisions of the rocks here would be no uncommon occur- 

 rence, but then it is known that only ten or fifteen miles southward of 

 the Kohat salt tract palaeozoic* and mesozoic rocks were deposited, car- 

 boniferous, Jurassic, and cretaceous groups occurring in and near Chichali 

 pass in the Soor (Sur) ghar mountains close to the Sheen (Shin) ghar 

 range, while one or both of the latter formations may be found among 

 the mountains just to the north and north-west of Kohat at a distance 

 of twenty miles from the salt region. Thus, unless the salt series of this 

 district formed dry ground, a most extraordinary cessation of deposition 

 which was going on around within some milesf must have taken place 

 during the two great early and protracted periods of palseontological 

 time. If it were dry ground however, the existence of unconformity or 

 any traces of ancient denudation are wanting to corroborate the fact, 

 and of all known varieties of rocks, soft clays, gypsum, and soluble salt, 

 seem to be among those least calculated to preserve their original surface 

 of deposition, or to resist the action of atmospheric denudation during 

 countless ages. 



There being no signs of the removal of the ancient formations from 

 above the salt, imagination fails to suggest by what barrier deposition 

 could have been arrested during such a lengthened time, and it is there- 

 fore well nigh impossible to believe that this salt series can be in any 

 degree contemporaneous with that of the Cis-Indus area. 



* Carboniferous both sides of Chichali pass* Fleming's report, cit. pages 261 and 461 . 

 The Jurassic and cretaceous groups were seen here by the writer and identified by 

 Dr. Waagen, who thought some of the lower beds might possibly be triassic. The carboni- 

 ferous beds do not appear in the Pass section. 



f Distances to which the former expansion of £rd in north and south directions may 

 be added. 



A sacred saline spring giving off inflammable gas has also been heard of near or on 

 Mr. Medlicott's Gumber fault near Juwala Muki, a dozen miles or so westward of Kangra, 

 also in the tertiary rocks. 



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