208 WYNNE: TRANS-INDUS SALT REGION, KOHAT DISTRICT. 



Bahadur Khel. — The quarries of Bahadur Khel are situated in 

 the richest outcrops of the whole Trans-Indus region, these exceeding by 

 far any of the outcrops in the Cis-Indus Salt Range. These outcrops 

 extend over fully four miles in length, with a breadth of from a quarter to 

 half a mile, between two ridges, running from east to west. In the 

 eastern half of this tract the salt shows in a great number of out- 

 cropping exposures, while the western half is almost entirely of naked 

 salt ; patches of gypsum or earth to conceal it being rare. The road 

 leads over salt, and the brook of saturated brine which drains the valley 

 flows westerly over pure salt-rock, part of the salt surface being cut 

 down by the water to the level of this stream. The salt which has 

 retained its higher level forms embankments on either side of the valley, 

 or rises in hills within it. Two of these are remarkable for their size, 

 being about 200 feet high, and standing near each other in the middle of 

 the basin (see Frontispiece) . The strongest dip of the salt is to the north ; 

 but there are indications of an anticlinal structure. Where the salt is 

 most exposed, it has a breadth of over 1,500 feet, with an angle of incli- 

 nation that gives a thickness of at least a thousand feet, and as this 

 only includes what is visible, the actual thickness there may be much 

 greater. 



The larger portion of the salt consists of pure workable strata, a 

 small part only being unfit for excavation. I measured on the western 

 of the two large salt hills mentioned a continuous series of workings 

 through 140 feet of salt strata. Besides this there were many other 

 workings in the same line of section, as well as in other parts of the valley, 

 near where it is crossed by the Kohat and Bannu road, this having appar- 

 ently decided the choice of locality. The salt, considered unfit for working, 

 was that mixed with a larger proportion of the same bluish clay which, 

 more or less, pervades almost all the salt layers of this locality. The 

 clay is quite harmless, and it is only the larger quantity of it occasion- 

 ally locally present which hindered the excavation of certain of the 

 strata where purer layers were to be found close at hand ; no other ad- 



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