1841.] Report on subjects connected with Afghanistan. 807 



Afredi range, which forms the south-east boundary of the valley. If 

 the water of the great basin selected this as the direction of the 

 least resistance, that part of the valley now open towards the Indus 

 must have since undergone depression. Dr. Lord supports his hypo- 

 thesis with considerable ingenuity, but he has omitted to observe, that 

 the rolled pebbles of Jumrood are not limited even to the most exten- 

 sive allowable sphere of action of the rush of the waters of the Jilala- 

 bad basin, but form a well-developed belt or glacis slope all round the 

 bases of the boundaries of the valley. Nor does Dr. Lord mention 

 that boulders, constituting glacis slopes, exist on the west side of the 

 Khybur pass, from its mouth to the Cabul river at Dhukka, that is, on 

 the side of, or in that which he assumes to have been, the great basin. 

 If the boulders and shingle, composing these vast extents of glacis 

 slopes are found to have been constituent portions of the ranges of 

 mountains, their formation is, I think, naturally explicable, by the 

 agency of floods, which are no doubt frequent and severe during the 

 spring months. The intimate mixture of the boulders and shingle, by 

 which I mean smaller water-worn stones, which may be observed even 

 to the rather sudden transition to the tillable soil, may be explained per- 

 haps by allowing great inequalities in violence of the floods. But I think 

 I have more than once seen these water-worn stones and boulders lodged 

 on the sides of mountains in situations which would not, as it appears to 

 me, warrant us in the invariable adoption of such an agency, unless 1 

 am mistaken. I might especially refer to the sand ranges about Gun- 

 damuck, on which, unless my recollection fails me, boulders are abun- 

 dantly strewn, and which could not have been brought to their present 

 situation by the action of water. It would be, however, useless to 

 speculate further on a point which a practised geologist would determine 

 at a glance. I fear that I have already infringed the principle, that 

 no one is authorised to remark on things he has not studied. 



I return to my impressions on the physical features of Affghanistan. 

 This country is also, I think remarkable, always keeping in view that 

 I write, drawing my comparisons from India, the country with which 

 I am better acquainted than any other, for the smallness in number and 

 size of its rivers and streams. From the general dryness of the 

 Rivers and Streams, climate, perhaps many springs cannot be expected, 

 and the summer supply will be almost entirely confined to the streams, 



5 K 



