54 



LA TOUCHE : GEOLOGY OF NORTHERN SHAN STATES. 



to some portion of the Purana group of Sir T. Holland, 1 including 

 such series as the Bijawars and Cuddapahs of the Indian Peninsula. 



It seems possible that the Chaung-Magyi series of the Shan 

 States may correspond with the Hu-t'o system 

 sySeTofcWna' 11 E " r% '° (neo-Proterozoic) of Northern Shan-si in China,2 

 though no limestones occur among them in 

 our region. If this is the case, they should be regarded as pre- 

 Cambrian, for in China they are succeeded by a series of strata, the 

 Sinian system, in the lower part of which Cambrian fossils are found. 3 

 The fact that the Cambrian beds of China are related by their fauna 

 to those of Spiti in the Central Himalaya and of the Salt Range 

 in the Punjab 4 suggests that, although there does not seem to have 

 been a direct communication between the two Provinces, they were 

 deposited on either side of a great land area, and that in Cambrian 

 times the Chinese sea did not extend so far to the south-west as 

 the Shan States, submergence of the latter not taking place until 

 Ordovician times. The nearest point in this direction at which 

 fossiliferous Cambrian strata have been found is in southern Yunnan, 

 where M. Lantenois 5 has described a series of finely laminated slaty 

 shales, sandstanes, and limestone bands in the valley of the Ta-Ho 

 river, near I-liang Hsien (Y-Leang) to the east of Yunnan-Fu, con- 

 taining Olenellus (Mesonacis) Vemeaui Mansuy, Lingulella cf. primceva 

 Hicks, Obolella sp., etc. The beds occupy an area of about 50 kil- 

 ometres in length and 20 in breadth, and are overlaid by limestones 

 of middle Devonian or of Carboniferous age. Strata corresponding 

 in every respect with the Chaung-Magyi series were also found in 

 Yunnan by Mr. Coggin Brown, and they probably correspond to the 

 ' untersinische schichten', of Richthofen and Lorenz in Shan-tung. 



The conditions that immediately preceded the deposition of the 

 Ordovician strata in the Shan States appear to have been very similar 



1 Imperial Gazetteer of India, 1904, Vol. I, Chap. II, p. 9. 



2 Bailey Willis, Research in China; Carnegie Institution, Washington, (1907), Vol. 

 I, Pt. I, p. 123. 



3 W. Dames in V. Richthofen's China, Vol. IV, pp. 1—33 : E. Kayser, Ibid, pp. 34—30: 

 C. D. Walcott, Cambrian Faunas of China, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., Vol. XXIX, p. 1 ; Vol. 

 XXX, p. 563 : Bailey Willis, Op. ext., Vol. I, Pt. 1, pp. 29, 34 ; Vol. II, p. 40 : Th. Lorenz, 

 Beitrlige zur Geologie und Pal.eontologie von Ostasien ; Zcitschr. d Deutsrh. Oeol. Oesel- 

 ks /.. Bd. LVII, p. 444; Bd. LVII1, p. 81. 



* F. R. Cowper Reed, Cambrian Fauna of Spiti ; Pal. Ind., Ser. XV, Vol. VII, Mem. 

 No. 1, p. 69: Pre-Carboniferous Life- Provinces ; Records, Oeol. Snrv. Ind., Vol. XL, 

 I'l. 1. p. 10. K. Redlich, Cambrian Fauna of the Eastern Salt Range; Pal. Ind., New 

 Ser., Vol. I, Mom, No. 1, p. 12. 



* Mission Coologiquc ct Miniere du Yunnan Mcridionale ; Annates des Mines, Ser. 10, 

 Vol. XI. p. 308, acq. 



