PAINKANDA SECTIONS. 13c 



found a coarse sandstone resting unconformably on the altered Num- 

 mulitic rocks. It is a grey sandstone of the pepper-and-salt colour 

 common in the Siwaliks, in thin banks, divided by shaly portions of 

 the same, and partings of gritty conglomerate. I found no traces of 

 organic remains in these beds. They are unconformably overlaid ; and 

 lost under masses of younger deposits near Dongpu. Probably the 

 deeply eroded Sutlej valley would show better sections of this form- 

 ation, but I was not allowed to descend into it. 



One feature is plainly seen. The sandstone, which cannot oe 

 older than miocene, and which must correspond to one of the Siwalik 

 horizons, has a rolling dip to north, and shows a great amount of 

 erosion. The upturned edges of the sandstone beds are deeply eroded 

 into, and the whole is evenly capped by younger deposits. Conglo- 

 merates, grits, soft friable sandstone and clays rest horizontally alike 

 over this sandstone and the older beds below. The total thickness 

 of these deposits cannot be under 350 to 400' near Dongpu, but is 

 probably much more near the centre of the basin. As already de- 

 scribed in the chapter on the tertiaries of Hundes, these horizontal 

 deposits contain occasionally remains of Mammalia, of which a few 

 fragments were excavated by Sub-Assistant Lala Kishen Singh, near 

 Dongpu. 



Eastern Painkanda and Johar. 



Directly east of the Niti area extend the districts of Eastern 

 Painkanda and Johcir, which I found most difficult ground. Were 

 it not for certain characteristic horizons, that tract could scarcely 

 have been explored. 



Although the map of this area presents a very variegated appear- 

 ance, and seemingly shows an irregular distribution of the various 

 formations, yet there is the same system of flexures met with in each 

 one of the cross-sections. The belt of sedimentary rocks which runs 

 from north-west to south-east may stratigraphically be divided into 

 three strips ; the palaeozoic one, the trias-rhaetic and the younger 

 mesozoic, which runs along the Himalayan-Tibet frontier. During 

 K 2 ( 131 ) 



