20 Dr. Verchere on the Geology of Kashmir, [No. 1, 



fossils found in the nummulitic limestone above. 3. It appears 

 much disturbed and dislocated by local movements, whilst the num- 

 mulitic limestone is to be seen in regular, though much tilted-up 

 beds above it. 4. It rests immediately over beds of red marl and 

 gypsum which are always found, in the Punjab, where Oolitic beds 

 Occur much disturbed. 5. Some of the corals appear identical with 

 some species found near Maree on the Indus, in a limestone containing 

 the same fossils as those of Sheikh Bodeen which is decidedly an 

 Oolite. 



I have therefore, in consideration of these reasons coloured these beds 

 as Oolitic, but there is a doubt about it. The country was so dan- 

 gerous at the time we were encamped at Palusseen, that I could 

 collect but very few fossils, and I have not yet had the good luck to 

 discover a similar bed in British territory. 



These coral reefs reappear in many places in the countiy of the 

 Wuzeerees : at the entrance of the plateau of Rushmuk a great 

 quantity of this bed was again seen, but the rock was different, though 

 the fossils were identical ; the limestone was extremely impure, full 

 of small rounded grains of gravel, and so much invaded by iron that it 

 is often quite brown, and often also spotted by the iron forming little 

 dark nodules in the mass. 



Again, near the hot spring of Sir-Oba, similar beds were seen 

 resting on red marl, with here and there masses of gypsum. This 

 gypsum is opaque, white and compact, and contains a great number 

 of crystals of quartz, very fine in their form, and terminated at both 

 ends by a six-sided pyramid. The same crystals occur at Maree and 

 Kalabag in the gypsum which accompanies the rock-salt of these 

 localities, and are there collected and sold to natives as ornaments, 

 under the name of Kalabag diamonds. 



One of the members of the nummulitic genus in the Wuzeeree Hills 

 requires notice on account of its economical value. The Wuzeeree 

 iron is obtained by the smelting of a brown shale, extremely rich in 

 brown haematite ; the beds of the shale are situated under the num- 

 mulitic limestone, and seem to replace the extensive beds of slate, with 

 nummulites, seen in other localities. The quantity of the ore is 

 enormous, whole ridges being formed of it. It is not quarried, as far 

 as I could discover, but merely broken off the surface of the beds. It 



