250 Report on the Geological Structure of the Salt Range. [No. 3; 



ed Government to economize the mineral as much as possible. The 

 powdered and inferior salt now wasted in the mines, might all be 

 saved by dissolving it in water in deep tanks. In these all mud and 

 mechanical impurities would rapidly subside, and on the brine solu- 

 tion becoming clear, it might be run off and evaporated by the heat 

 of the sun in other shallow tanks or by passing the brine through 

 mattings exposed to the sun and air, on which it would rapidly 

 crystallize. In the Austrian mines, the brine obtained from impure 

 salt is dried up in large evaporating houses, but as in this country 

 the heat of the sun would serve instead of fuel, the expense would 

 be but trifling and a large quantity obtained of a salt which for many 

 purposes would be preferable to rock salt. 



By economizing also the numerous brine springs and streams 

 which issue from the Salt Bange a large supply of an inferior salt 

 could be obtained, and which if sold at a cheap rate, would, we 

 believe, be extensively purchased by the natives, for agricultural 

 purposes. 



A large quantity also of an impure salt (a mixture of chloride of 

 sodium and sulphate of soda) might be collected from the banks 

 of the Kullur Kuhar and Sumoondur salt lakes,* which is now 

 utterly useless, the natives on their banks not being even allowed to- 

 remove it to give their cattle. 



Gypsum. 



G-ypsum occurs in the marl in a manner similar to the salt, irregu- 

 lar beds and huge masses being scattered through it, wherever it 

 occurs in beds it is much cracked, the fissures being filled with red 

 marl or a bluish clay. Beds of it seem to be both above and below 

 the salt. In some localities the strata of gypsum are remarkably 

 bent and contorted, as if they had been subjected to violent, lateral 

 pressure, previous to their being shattered and upheaved. The mi- 

 neral is for the most part of a light grey colour with a shade of blue, 

 and translucent on the edges. It has a saccharine appearance, but 

 masses in which a coarse crystalline structure prevails are by no 



* The water of this lake has a Sp. Gr. of 1.02 five hundred (500) grains eva- 

 porated to dryness yielded 14.97 grains of saline matter consisting of sulphate 

 of soda and chlorides of sodium and magnesium with a trace of chloride of 

 calcium. 



