I860.] Geological Notes on the Khasi Hills. 11 



breadth, flowing very sluggishly ; in its bed the sandstones had a south- 

 easterly dip of about 5 degrees. A ford was formed about a quarter of a 

 mile clown, it was water knee-deep, but a very small fall of rain would 

 have rendered it quite impassable. At the junction of a tributary from 

 the south-west a short distance further down the right bank, the path 

 leaves the Urn Blay, and follows the new stream. In the bed I at once 

 noticed rolled pieces of coal. Sandstone of the coarse purple kind was 

 exposed in thick beds on the ravine side, dipping south with 7 degrees ; 

 and further up, the coal occurred in water-worn lumps quite 2 lbs. in 

 weightjits fracture was bright. At half a mile the path leaves this ravine 

 on its left bank, continuing steeply through a magnificent forest with 

 very little undergrowth. As one ascends, the sandstones become finer 

 and lighter, and at about 400 feet in a side ravine with water coal 

 again was noticed in its bed, showing that it lay high in the series. 

 Leaving the path, I struck up the steep ravine, which gave every 

 promise of a good section being obtained, and it has well repaid the 

 trouble of the climb, for at 50 feet of vertical height, coal was found. 

 It rested on ferruginous coarse sands, and was overlain by a 

 coarsish white quartz-grit, with a few little dark cliscolorations here 

 and there. I am not over-estimating the thickness of this lowest bed 

 of coal at six feet, and in places it was more ; the bedding was ir- 

 regular. On a like surface of the strata below it I commenced here to 

 take in the whole of the measurements with a 10 feet pole, well 

 knowing how very wild some estimates have been, especially with 

 regard to coal beds ; that at Cherra Poonjee, for instance, having been 

 put down at as much as 17 feet by one officer. The results are given 

 in section b, Plate II, shewing thus more clearly the succession of 

 the beds and coal seams, which, good and bad, gave a total of 20 feet. 

 The similarity of the upper fine beds was remarkable, as being very 

 like those which were seen capping the Liimdekorh Hill. 



Leaving this section and continuing the march, we ascended along 

 the face of the hill, the coal showing again on the path itself. On 

 reaching the compact hard beds of sandstone (vide Section on Plate 

 III.) the ascent ended, and the general level of the country dips away 

 with the even slope of its dark brown weathered surface towards the 

 south, and in many parts over several acres in extent is entirely bare, 

 all earthy matter having been washed off it. A quarter of a mile further 



