STRATIGR^PHICAL FEATURES. 55 



seems therefore that a great thickness of a more or less uniformly 

 developed series of strata extends in several parallel strips from the 

 Nepal frontier to Kashmir. 



Between the southern folds of the Himalayas, there are several 



parallel synclinals. With them this memoir 



Southern synclinals. 



does not deal, but I may mention that as far as 



I have become acquainted with the rocks forming these synclinals, I 

 believe them to be generally identical with the haimantas north of the 

 Central Himalayas but differing from the latter in lithological 

 characters. 



The total thickness of this system is very considerable, and ex- 

 ceeds that of any of the succeeding formations. 



Thickness. 



It can hardly be less than 3,000 and scarcely 

 more than 4,000 feet. It is too extensively crushed and folded (see fig, 

 10) to admit of a more accurate estimate, and the lower boundary of it, 

 where the beds pass into the underlying vaikrita schists, is too ob- 

 scure, and is often entirely hidden by gigantic granite intrusions. 



3. Silurian. 



In the sections between the two parallel ranges cf the Central 

 Himalayas, the haimanta system invariably passes upwards into a 

 great thickness of beds which have yielded fossils throughout. 

 There is not the slightest break in conformity ; the red and greenish 

 shales of the upper haimantas (3 in the figured sections) pass 

 upwards * into and alternate with the lowest beds of the silurians 

 which form a system of not Jess than 1,300 to 1,400 feet in the 

 Niti area, and rather more than 2,000 feet in the easternmost sections. 

 The lithological character of the system is most constant, and I 

 could distinguish two great divisions of it. 



In descending order : 



Numbers in figured 

 sections. 



5. Flesh-coloured and brown quartzites 



with shales .... Upper ) 



r ... T \ Silurian. 



4. Coral limestone . . . . Lower J 



These two divisions form one conformable whole, and pass 



( 55 ) 



