190 



PROF. P. IT. DUNCAN ON" THE 



14. On the Corallieerotts Series of Sind, and its Connexion with 

 the last Upheaval of the Himalayas. By Prof. P. Martin- 

 Duncan, M.B. Lond., P.R.S., E.L.S., &c. (Read February 2, 

 1881.) 



Contents. 



I. Introduction : the History of the Geology of Sind ; Questions involved. 

 II. The Stratigraphical Position of the Series and of the Ossiferous Manchhar 

 deposits. 



III. General Results regarding the Alliances and Peculiarities of the Corals of 



the Series. The Prenummulitie, JSTumnmlitic, Oligocene, and Miocene 

 Coral-faunas of Sind. 



IV. The Equivalence of the Manchhar and Sivalik deposits. 



V. General Considerations regarding the Age of the last Himalayan Uplift. 



I. Introduction §c. 



A memoir by Grant, illustrated by Sowerby, which appeared in the 

 4 Transactions' of the Geological Society (series 2, vol. v. 1837), first 

 brought the countries west and east of the Indus under the notice 

 of European geologists. Fossils from Sind, Baluchistan, and Cutch 

 were therein described ; and the types were presented to the Society. 

 But it is to Mr. Yicary that science owes the first attempt at a com- 

 plete description of the geology of Sind *. "Written in 1847, the 

 fossils which should have illustrated his paper, and some others 

 collected by Lieut. Blagrove in Cutch, were handed over to 

 MM. d'Archiac and Jules Haime for examination and publica- 

 tion. Their fine work, the ' Description des Animaux Eossiles du 

 groupe Nummulitique de l'lnde,' was published in 1852. They only 

 recognized one geological horizon, the Nummulitic, although Grant 

 had expressed an opinion that there was more than one fossili- 

 ferous series. Messrs. Cook and Carter added to the knowledge of 

 the Baluchistan area in 1860 f ; and the last-named naturalist felt 

 it necessaiy to give a Miocene age to some fossils which Sowerby 

 had figured for Grant. On the other hand, MM. dArchiac and 

 Jules Haime severely criticised M. d'Orbigny for stating that some 

 of their Sindian species were of Palunian age, and decided against 

 Dr. Carter's grouping of some of the marine Tertiary beds as 

 Miocene £. 



In 1863 Mr. Henry M. Jenkins, E.G.S., at that time Assistant- 

 Secretary of this Society, and myself were endeavouring to learn 

 something about Tertiary deposits situated as remotely as possible 

 from European types. 



A collection of Mollusca and Corals from Java had been sent to 

 the Society by M. de Groot ; and we proceeded to examine them ; 

 and in order to determine the affinities of some, which seemed to be of 

 younger age than the xSfummulitic, it became necessary to study the 

 work of MM. d'Archiac and Haime on India and to examine their types. 



We found that there was a species in Java which my friend called 



* Quart. Journ. Geol. Soc. 1847, vol. iii. p. 334. 



t Cook, Trans. Med. Phys. Soc. Bombay, vol. vi. pp. 1-45; Carter, Journ. 

 Bombay Royal Asiatic Society, vol. vi. p. 184. 



\ See Carter, Geol. Papers on Western India, pp. 628-770, and the general 

 resume in their work already noticed. 



