242 GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF INDIA. 



of Sind which, lies west of the Indus, and especially the hilly 

 portions of the Karachi and Shikarpur colleetorates, together with 

 the curious isolated ranges of limestone hills to the east of the 

 Indus in Northern Sind near Rohri, and in Southern Sind near 

 Haidarabad. The examination of the geology of the province was 

 a special desideratum as the peninsula of India has had a very 

 different geological history from other parts of the country, the 

 former having probably been land ever since palaeozoic times at 

 least, while the extra-peninsular regions have frequently been 

 covered by sea. Fuller series of marine tertiary beds were known 

 to exist in Sind than elsewhere in India, and other advantages lay 

 in the absence of forest which so greatly impedes surveying, and 

 in the circumstance that large collections of fossils from this 

 region have been carefully examined and described by European 

 palaeontologists. Sind is also nearer to Europe than most parts 

 of India, and the rocks form the eastern prolongation of a tract 

 of tertiary beds believed to be continuous with the well-known 

 formations on the shores of the Mediterranean. The Khirthar 

 group, named from the great frontier range of hills, comprises 

 by far the most conspicuous rock, the massive nummulitic limestone, 

 of which formation all the higher ranges in Sind consist. The 

 sections exposed in the Khirthar range are superb, and afford the 

 best epitome of tertiary geology hitherto observed in India. Above 

 is found the Nari group, occupying a belt of varying width from 

 one to ten miles in breadth throughout the eastern flank of the 

 Khirthar range ; the lower beds of this group are mostly yellow 

 or brown limestone, while the upper series assume the form of 

 coarse, massive, thick-bedded sandstones, attaining in some places 

 a thickness over 4,000 feet. Upon the Nari group, almost through- 

 out Sind, is found resting a mass of highly fossiliferous limestones 

 and calcareous beds (the Gaj group), easily distinguished from the 

 limestones of the older tertiary formations by the absence of 

 nummulites, while the highest sub-division of the Sind tertiary 

 series, the Manchhar group, represents in all probability the well- 

 known Siwaliks of Northern India, consisting of clays, sandstones, 

 and conglomerates, and attaining in places a thickness of about 

 10,000 feet, Westward of the British frontier the Manchhar beds 

 die away, and are succeeded by high hills of hard greyish-white 

 marls or clays, conspicuous at Bas Malan, Ormara, Pasni, Gwadar, 

 near Jashk, at the entrance to the Persian Gulf, and on the Persian 

 shores of the gulf itself. The headlands of Ras Malan, Ormara, 



