2l6 GRIESBACH : GEOLOGY OF THE CENTRAL HIMALAYAS. 



guide in such cases. Besides the red haimanta quartz-shales (3), it is 

 the only red formation : a patchy red bed occurs in the rhsetic and a 

 semi-metamorphic red bed amongst, the Nummulitic series, but with 

 neither can the red Crinoid limestone be confounded. 



It is overlaid by the white quartzite (8), the Muth quartzite of 

 White quartzite series Stoliczka. This also is an old friend, met with 

 W' in the Garhwal and Kumaun area, where I es- 



tablished its upper carboniferous age ; it seems one of the most 

 widely distributed of Himalayan formations, and Mr. Lydekker has 

 shown that it also occurs in Kashmir near the base of the Ruling 

 shales. 1 



The junction with the underlying Red Crinoid limestone is well 

 defined, although several irregularly intercalated beds of the latter are 

 found in the white quartzite near the boundary. 



The main mass of the series is formed of fine-grained white quart- 

 zite in thick solid beds ; in its upper portion the quartzite becomes 

 occasionally a silicious sandstone, and there are now and then some 

 thin limestone beds intercalated in the more eastern sections. Near 

 Muth village in the Pin river valley the total thickness of it is about 

 500 feet. Some fossil traces, chiefly of Brachiopods, are found on the 

 weathered surfaces of the rock, rarely in good preservation, and are 

 indicative of the carboniferous age of the series. 



Oldham has correctly correlated the Muth quartzite with the car- 

 boniferous white quartzite of Kashmir, 2 but he does not seem to have 

 noticed the carboniferous beds which both underlie and overlie the 

 formation. 



It is overlaid conformably by a hard, splintery grey limestone 

 Grey limestone series (&> a) in flaggy beds, of a total thickness of 

 ( 8j a )- about 70 feet, which has yielded numerous 



fossils, though few in species. Amongst them are several Producti, 

 Athyris royssii and Corals. Its evident connection with the white 

 quartzite (8) and fossils define its upper carboniferous age. 



The small ravine which descends near the village of Muth (see 



* Mem Geol. Surv. Ind., Vol. XXII. a Rec. XXI, p. 151-3. 



( 2.6 ) 



