1 854.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 6 1 7 



South of Darjiling, forming the lower portion of the great range of the 

 outer Himalayan, occurs a group of sandstones, hard greenish coloured 

 clunchy clays, and a few beds of shales, or laminated clays, forming together 

 one continuous formation, attaining a stratigraphical thickness of upwards 

 of 4000 feet. These all dip at high angles (40° to 70°) towards the north 

 and north by west ; or towards the hills. Their actual junction with the 

 great mass of the gneissose, micaceous and quartzose metamorphic rock of 

 which the higher masses of the hills are composed, was not traced in the 

 neighbourhood of the Teesta ; but their connection can be seen more to the 

 west, where these sandstones are brought into contact with the metamor- 

 phic rocks by a great fault which bears nearly east and west. 



In these sandstones, occur many imbedded stems of trees often of large 

 size, frequently much worn and deprived of their bark and branches, but 

 occasionally with the bark perfectly preserved and mineralized into a bril- 

 liant jet ; the mass or central part of the stem being replaced by siliceous 

 matter. In the bed of shales associated with the sandstones, occur numer- 

 ous leaves of dicotyledonous trees, in all cases detached, and often much 

 worm-eaten and decayed, but in general aspect of a very recent or modern 

 character. Near the river Teesta, I did not find myself any remains of ani- 

 mals, nor did I hear on enquiry from the natives that such had ever been 

 found. Dr. J. Hooker in his most interesting Journals mentions that he found 

 in the continuation of these same rocks, a little further to the westward, 

 what he thought was the shaft of a bone, and also some very imperfect ve- 

 getable remains, which he referred to Vertebraria. The correctness of the 

 latter reference, I am inclined to doubt. After a careful search, I could 

 myself find nothing of the kind, although numerous vegetable remains were 

 met with ; and I am tolerably certain that no trace of this remarkable genus 

 Vertebraria is to be met with there. 



These rocks extend into Bhotan on the east, and stretch away to the west 

 also, but their limits in either direction are unknown. So far as they have 

 been traced, they maintain the same general direction and dip. 



The whole thickness of these rocks (more than 400 feet) consists of per- 

 fectly conformable beds, following in regular sequence, and containing 

 identically similar plants in the uppermost as well as in the lowest beds of 

 the group. They constitute therefore one great formation, the upper infe- 

 rior limits of which are in this district unseen ; and which from the mine- 

 ral character of the rocks, from the imbedded remains of plants, and from 

 their general aspect and arrangement, I would refer to the same epoch, as 

 the great Sewalik group of the N. W. Provinces. 



Of these sandstones, several small detached patches occur far within the 

 hills, as in the valley of the Rungeet near Oushok, &c. &c, a fact of great 



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