1866.] the Western Himalaya and Afghan Mountains. 105 



the [topper and salt sand has been washed out from between the harder 

 beds, whilst in the horizontal strata, the sand has been protected by 

 one of the strata of harder rock which acted as a roof over the sand 

 underneath. 



Now this pepper and salt sand is the one washed for gold. The 

 washings are done during and after the rains, as the swollen waters of 

 the torrents bring down to the beds of the rivers a large quantity of 

 fresh sand. It is washed in the usual manner, and gives a residue of a 

 black sand which is composed of shining grains of magnetic iron ore 

 and grains of augite. A little more washing in a smaller vessel 

 removes the augite and a great part of the iron ; and the gold, which 

 is rarely visible with the naked eye, is picked up by mercury. 



If we examine the pepper and salt sand in situ, we shall very soon 

 become convinced that it is nothing but the porphyry of the Himalaya 

 ground down to powder, for we find in it numerous pieces of the 

 porphyry not quite crushed to sand. I have found some of these pieces 

 half an inch long and composed of a hard fragment of albite supporting 

 specks of augite. Pieces of the large felspathic crystals I have 

 seen also, and the smaller crystals of quartz are frequent and hardly 

 altered and rubbed. The sandstone consists mostly of undecomposed 

 albite and augite. It is not easy to describe in words the great 

 similarity between the porphyry and the white sand, but their 

 complete identity strikes one at once when we study the beds. 

 Dr. Fleming made therefore a good guess when he wrote the following 

 passage: "We have been quite unable to trace the source whence 

 the gold has been derived, and are not aware that amongst the 

 quartzites and quartzose mica slates (felstone is meant,) which are 

 much developed in the Punjal Range, near the Baramoola Pass into 

 Kashmir, and stretch west into the northern Hazara mountains, tho 

 metal has ever been detected in situ. From similar rocks there can 

 be little doubt that the auriferous sands have been derived."* 



And again he writes : " In the neighbourhood of the Salt Range 

 the scales of gold are small and almost invisible, but we have heard 

 from natives, that, in Hazara, grains of gold are sometimes found of 

 a size such as to admit of their being picked out of the sand. If 



* Report on Geological Structure of Salt Range : Selections, P. Govt. Vol. II. 

 3855, page 342. 



