1850.] in Southern and Central India. 291 



December 23rd, 1819. — Granite as usual, and camp at Sooriapet, be- 

 yond the Mussy, the bed of which is here very broad; I observed no rocks. 



Mungal, 24th December, 1819. Granite as usual. 



Shermahommedpet, 25th December, 1819. — I gathered some granite 

 on the road to this place, here I first saw the black soil. 



Nundigaon, 26th December, 1819. — On my road from the last 

 village to Nundigaon, I ascended a hill, at the foot of which the road 

 ran. It was composed of granite, which here and there contained 

 lumps of the micaceous granite. Its upper third was composed of 

 granular quartz rock, or it may be called a highly crystallized sand- 

 stone. I also observed near Nundigaon a vein of basalt passing through 

 the granite, which was of the usual kind, but contained more hornblende 

 than usual. 



Chinchirlak, 27th December, 1819. — A. coss distant from Purteal, 

 we quitted Chinchirlak at day-light to go to the diamond mines at 

 Purteal, which lies nearly south of the former, about a coss. We pass- 

 ed through the black soil covered with fine crops of jouwarrie ; about 

 three miles to our left was a range of mountains which bounded the plain 

 to the eastward running due north and south. On the other side were 

 the indistinct ranges of Polychinta on the banks of the Kistnah and 

 before us those of Condapilly. On our approach to Purteal we began to 

 perceive many rolled pieces of quartz, greenstone, jasper, sandstone and 

 granite ; evidently not the debris of the neighbouring mountains. The 

 mining process had been sometime abandoned, and the workmen were 

 employed at the site of the old excavations in resifting the old rubbish ; 

 the produce of their labour scarcely repaid them with the means of 

 subsistence. The old excavations were very numerous, and about 20 

 yards square, and filled all over with water and rolled stones, I found a 

 breccia limestone containing quartz, garnets and jasper. They were of 

 an irregular form and did not appear to have been subjected to the 

 action of running water ; I enquired if diamonds were ever found in 

 them, and was answered in the negative. The process of searching for 

 diamonds performed before me was as follows. The large stones were 

 first thrown on one side and the remainder of the heap carried into a 

 raised platform of mud where from a sieve, the large ones were dropt on 

 the ground by means of a lateral motion of the hand and the dust re- 

 maining deposited in another mass which was spread abroad, wetted 



