1854] Notes on the Geology of the Punjab Salt Range. 655 



mine. The gallery leading into the mine is very steep as may be 

 imagined by the fact of part of the chamber where the salt is worked, 

 being immediately nnder the external entrance. The gallery, which 

 is partly natural, partly artificial, passes through marl and gypsum, 

 and averages six feet by three. The form of the mine is an irre- 

 gular oval, 400 feet long and from 60 to 160 feet broad. The height 

 is probably not less than 35 feet, though this is a mere guess. The 

 floor slopes considerably from the entrance and the brine which 

 percolates through the mine collects along the sides, forming pools, 

 which, by the faint light of the lamps, have a very stygian and dole- 

 ful aspect. What the thickness of the salt is, it is impossible to 

 ascertain, but some idea of its extent may be formed by the fact of 

 several mines being excavated at different levels in the crystalline 

 salt, each capable of containing a very decent sized house. It by 

 no means, however, follows that the difference of level between the 

 mines necessarily affords any indication of the thickness of the salt, 

 as the whole of this vast bed has been faulted and displaced in the 

 most extraordinary manner. 



I now come more particularly to the Geology of the range and 

 should here premise that I have no wish to institute any comparison 

 between the deposits in the Salt Range and similar ones in Europe. 

 The great and interesting problem of geological identity I leave to 

 abler hands and trust that ere long, the collections of fossils for- 

 warded to Europe will have gone far to clear up all doubts on the 

 point and to settle definitely the age of the rocks under considera- 

 tion. I will add however that regarding the mere lithological cha- 

 racters of the strata, it would not be difficult to identify almost 

 every bed of the permian and saliferous rocks of Europe, in the beds 

 of the salt range, inferior to the nummulite limestone, but in an 

 inversed order to what they present in Europe. In taking a general 

 view of the Geology of the salt range, the question that first of all 

 presents itself is, " What has become of the other half of the range 

 and the rest of those sheets of solid rock, the abrupt and broken 

 edges of which, constitute the escarped and rugged southern margin 

 of the range from Mari to Bhotas, from the Jhilum to the Indus ?" 

 This question, though presenting few difficulties to the Geologist, is 

 far from uninteresting, and a brief glance may here be taken at the 



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