On the Structure of the Delta of the Ganges. 337 



the discovery of the coal " in situ." Underneath this stra- 

 tum, and in the gravelly bed which immediately succeeds it, 

 there were found several other fragments of fossil bones. 

 One was considered to be a small caudal vertebra of a kind 

 of lizard, and the rest were fragments of turtles. These 

 were discovered at the depth of 423 feet, and were associated 

 with large rolled pebbles of quartz, both white and amethes- 

 tine, felspar, limestone, and indurated clay. At 450 feet 

 in depth two other fragments of fossil turtles were found, 

 and associated with them there was a rolled fragment of 

 vescicular basalt. Again at 464£ feet, and still in the 

 same, a fragment of rolled lignite, similar exactly to speci- 

 mens now obtainable in Cuttack,* was discovered, and short- 

 ly afterwards the auger brought up a mass of decayed wood, 

 rounded on the edges as if rolled in a stream, but not in the 

 least carbonised, and being like in all respects to the frag- 

 ments found in the Sunderbun alluvium. The gravel com- 

 posed entirely of the debris of primary rocks, continued 

 to the depth of 481 feet, where the bore was checked by 

 the auger becoming jammed at the bottom of the iron tub- 

 ing in such a way as to foil every attempt made for its 

 removal, and to force the officers superintending the opera- 

 tions to bring them to a final close in April, 1840. 



From the preceding details it will be observed that the 

 Fort fossils were found in two distinct deposits, separated 

 from each other by the interposition of a bed of shelly calca- 

 reous clay, and a deposit of carbonaceous matter ten feet in 

 thickness, the remnants of some extensive forest which flou- 

 rished at a period anterior to the deposit of the 380 feet 

 of superincumbent sands and clays. The lithological charac- 

 ters of the superior and inferior fossiliferous deposits differ 

 considerably from each other, the former being a fine and 

 slightly indurated sandstone, the latter a coarse conglomerate, 



* Journal Asiatic Society, vol. vi. 



