1038 Remarks on the Geology, fyc. [Dec 



Report. 



The observations which we are now about to offer, being made 

 during the most unfavorable period of the year, viz. July, scarcely 

 a day passing in which our investigations were not interrupted by rain, 

 are far from perfect ; we hope however when the season is more 

 favorable we will be allowed to resume them. 



In the mean time our remarks will be principally confined to the 

 country extending between Bhar, and a few miles beyond Simla. 

 By means of the road sections and the numerous streams which 

 occur, the country here has been well opened up, rendering its 

 examination comparatively easy and satisfactory in general, in many 

 places however, from the various alterations and dislocations, difficulties 

 of no ordinary nature are encountered. 



The field which Ave are now about to enter on, although frequently 

 trodden by travellers, has never as yet engaged the particular 

 attention of any geologist, a remark which applies nearly to the 

 whole of the Himmalehs. Thus it has been lately remarked, " We 

 possess but little information as to the general direction and dip of 

 the strata of the Himmalehs ; even the principal geognostical features 

 of the various formations are scarcely at all known to us."* No 

 doubt some remarkable statements have been made, and none more 

 so than those of Mr. Gerard, who mentions that he met with fossil 

 shells, in alluvium, at a great height, as fresh and entire as if they had 

 recently emerged from their own element ; and that just before cross- 

 ing the boundary of Ladak and Bussahor, he found a bed of ante- 

 diluvian oysters, clinging to the rock as if they had been alive, 

 and that at 16,000 feet above the level of the sea. Well might the 

 author of the Geognosy of India conclude his remarks on the above, 

 with the observation, that verification of this is expected.t It is a state- 

 ment truly remarkable, and well worthy of the attention of future 

 travellers. In an address lately delivered to the Geological Society 

 of London by its late distinguished president,:}; we have the following 

 remarks, " that Captain Grant in his account of Cutch, and Mr. 

 Malcolmson in his description of a large portion of the Indian 

 peninsula, have not ventured to call strata which they have examined, 

 by the names which describe European formations." If any thing has 

 been proved by geological investigations, conducted in the different 

 quarters of the globe, it is, that in every country the rocks composing 



* British India, vol. Ill, p 316. f British India, vol. Ill, p 326. 



% Addressed to the Geol. Society, London, Feb. 1838. by the Rev. William Whewell. 



