1847.] VICARY ON THE GEOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF SINDE. 337 



About a mile-and-a-lialf east of the station there is a post-pUocene 

 clay about 60 to 100 yards in breadth, 6 to 10 feet in depth, and a 

 mile in length, which fills a depression, or denudation, in the arena- 

 ceous rock No. 6. It has been cut through by a water-course, and 

 in the section exposed I found numerous Pupse, Planorbi, Melanise, 

 a Terebellum, numerous broken columellse of Cerithia, and some 

 beads made of fish-bone, in all respects similar to those worn by native 

 children at the present day. Close to this on the surface I found 

 some fossil bones of crocodiles, but in a rolled and broken state. 



From Kurrachee in the direction of Munga-Peer to the foot of the 

 lower hills (the outskirts of the Hala Range), a distance of about four 

 miles, for the most part a dead level, but rising gently near the base 

 of the hills. It is possible that the ancient branch of the Indus, 

 above alluded to, found its way to the harbour in this direction. 

 Sections exposed by digging wells in the plain give the following 

 descending succession: — (a) 8 to 10 feet of a stiff yellow clay, con- 

 taining numbers of Planorbi, Pupse, Melanise *, with fragments of a 

 small species of Cyprsea, and occasionally of oysters and Cerithia. 

 (b) A bed of pebbles evidently derived from the broken-up conglome- 

 rate, (c) Sand resting on a light blue laminated clay. Approach- 

 ing the hills the plain becomes gradually obscured by a bed of gravel 

 and large pebbles, increasing in depth to the base of the range on 

 which it rests. From the base of the hills to Munga-Peer I followed 

 the course of a valley ; the rock composing the elevations on either 

 side being the nummulitic limestone of the Hala Range with its 

 peculiar fossils. Munga-Peer is a basin enclosed by hills excepting 

 to the N.W. and the valley by which I entered from the S.E. There 

 are two hot springs situated near the centre of the basin ; both rise 

 from partings of the strata, which at these points crop out at an 

 angle of 50°. The springs are about half a mile apart, and the water 

 is sweet. That of the most northern is so warm (124° Fahr.), that 

 I was obliged to withdraw my hand immediately. The other is 99°. 



There is not a vestige of a volcanic rock near, but the nummulitic 

 limestone through which the springs burst has been rendered some- 

 what crystalline by heat, and the fossils in the rock are almost ob- 

 literated. The basin of Munga-Peer is partly filled with a post- 

 pliocene formation similar in all respects to that noticed above. In 

 addition to the shells above-mentioned, I found an Area and a Nerita. 

 The Cerithium is exactly the same as that now existing in the harbour 

 of Kurrachee. I found this clay formation momiting up to a pass 

 through the hills to the westward, at an elevation of 300 feet above 

 the level of the basin. To the N.E. this clay contains a great quantity 

 of "Konkur," the well-known tufaceous formation of India. A little 

 farther in the same direction there is a narrow cleft in the range of 

 hills separating Munga-Peer from the plain without, through which 

 the drainage of the basin is effected by a small stream, on whose 

 banks I fomid considerable quantities of a pure white salt, m some 



* This Melania is found recent throughout Sinde, and I have often seen them 

 in water too salt to drink. 



