

148 HOLLAND: GEOLOGY OF THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF SALEM. 



APPENDIX. 



Geological observations made by Leschenault de la Tour during 

 his travels in Southern India (18 16 — 20), 



Introduction. 



Leschenault de la Tour's stay of over four years in the south of 

 India, between 18 16 and 1821, was devoted mainly to botanical 

 researches with a view to the economic development of Pondicherry 

 and other French possessions in the East. At the same time he 

 recorded a number of interesting geological observations, which 

 were supplemented by a valuable collection of some 1,500 speci- 

 ' mens now preserved in the " Museum d'Histoire Naturelle n in 

 Paris. Some of these— the pyroxenic gneisses and their associates- 

 have been described by Prof. A. Lacroix in an elaborate memoir 

 (S Contributions a l'6tude des gneiss a pyroxene et des roches a. 

 wernerite/ 1 Lacroix has generally referred to the rocks as having 

 been obtained from the neighbourhood of Salem. Leschenault made 

 more than one stay at Salem, and there became acquainted with 

 J. M. Heath who, as a "Junior Merchant " in the E. I. Company's ser- 

 vice, was then " Deputy Commercial Resident" at Salem. Heath, who 

 took a keen interest in the minerals of South India, had collected 

 largely from his own and the adjoining district of Coimbatore, and 

 gave of his abundance to Leschenault. This circumstance possibly 

 accounts for the frequent occurrence on Leschenault' s labels of the 

 expression "environs de Salem," occasionally rendered more in- 

 definite by the addition "et autres endroits." In 1898 I had the 

 privilege, through the courtesy of M. Lacroix, of examining the 

 Leschenault collection in Paris, and was able to identify many of the 

 specimens with well-known occurrences in the Salem and Coimbatore 

 districts. Some of these are referred to in the notes below. 



Bull, de la soc. fr. de Min., Vol. XII (1889), p. 83. Translation by Mallet, Rec, Geol. 

 Surv. Jnd.> Vol. XXIV (1891), p. 155. 



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