1854.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 399 



Report of the Curator Museum of Economic Geology. 



Geology and Mineralogy. — We have received from Walter Elliott, Esq. 

 Madras C. S. a box of fossil shells and rock specimens, of which he says,— 



By the Paragon, which sailed some days ago from Coringa, I sent you 

 a box for the Museum of Economic Geology containing some fossils and 

 minerals, from a curious formation about two miles north of Rajahmundry 

 near the village of Kateru. 



The fossils were brought to notice in quarrying some limestone strata for 

 the great works at Dovvlaiswaram constructed by Col. Cotton. They con- 

 sist of shells, which appear to me to be the same as those now found in the 

 sea on this coast> and they occur with the lime under a bed of trap rock over 

 which, where it is covered, lies a quantity of black Cotton soil. The 

 ground slopes from a small hill towards the place where the quarries have 

 been opened about 400 or 500 yards distant, the hill is also trap. 



The following is a section of the quarry which was first opened when I 

 visited the place in 1850. 



Black soil, . . . . , , 



Trap rock, disintegrating, 



Limestone, 



Clay and gravel, 



Yellow clay and sand, 



Limestone, 



Clay and sand, 



Limestone, 



Clay shale, white, yellow, purple, &c. . . 



Basalt with zeolites, 

 beyond which the excavation was discontinued. 



The shells occur immediately below the basalt, generally in indurated mud, 

 often very little changed ; in other places a bed of a fibrous mineral like a 

 fibrous limestone* occurs instead of the shells, from 2 to 4 inches thick. 



I again visited Kateru about two months ago, the quarries are now opened 

 much nearer the hill. The limestone bed is thicker and more solid, and the 

 superincumbent basalt of greater thickness also and not covered with soil. 

 The latter is of the same kind as that I have observed in the Dekhan com- 

 posed of rounded nuclei covered with numerous concentric coatings, which 

 peel off when exposed to the air. The following is a section of the quarry 

 as I saw it on the 13th January. 



* Which it is. H. P. 



3 a 2 





F. 



Inches. 



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3 







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5 







. . 



1 







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8 



. , 







3 



, . 



1 







, , 







4 





1 









2 



4 



, , 



H 







