1 83S.] Reports on ihe Coal and Mineral Resources of India, 1^7 



As far as the recent alluvium extends inland from the coasis the 

 surface ascends but liUle, but from the situation at which this disap= 

 pears the ascent must be so great as to render the rivers unnavigable, 

 fo r we find the base of Abu, as well as that of the Aravully range, 

 although the former is scarcely 100 miles from the run of Cutch to be 

 2000 feet in height, or equal to the general level of the crest of the 

 Vindhya, this important peculiarity pointed out by Colonel Tod appears 

 likely to account in a satisfactory way for some most interesting features 

 in the geology of Maiwa, on which swbject however it would here be 

 out of place to dwell, farther than to observe that the thinning out 

 towards the north of the great beds of basalt and amygdaloid, of which 

 Malwa and the Vindhya are composed, indicates the direction from 

 whence they were derived, and will account for these rocks reposing on 

 sandstone in the Nerbudda as well as in the Guzerat, though ap- 

 parently proceeding from beneath similar rocks in the northern con- 

 fines of Malwa. The great prevalence of quartz in the Chittore 

 range described by Mr. Hardy may also be explained in the same way 

 that similar rocks have been accounted for in the Kasya mountains. 



Mount Abu, to which there is a general inclination of all the higher 

 points of land in Central India, is situated in 24*^ 38' N. lat. and 72*^ 

 45' E. long,, and is 5000 feet in height. It rises abruptly from an 

 elevated plain which slopes gradually down to the run of Cutch on the 

 west, and the great desert on the north ; on the south-east are the table 

 lands of Malwa, and on the north-east the Aravully mountains. If the 

 latter were continued ten miles further to the south-east they would 

 necessarily form a junction with Abu ; but instead of which the chain 

 turns suddenly to the south, and passing within ten miles of Abu, forms 

 a junction by means of the Oodipore mountains with the plateau of 

 Malwa. 



" Abu is only accessible on the south-east, its general figure is that 

 of a cone, large enough to afford a spacious table land of many miles in 

 extent on the summit which is, however, broken by a rugged circle of 

 hills several hundred feet higher than any other part of the mountain 

 except the peak of Gunoo Sikha, the centre of which is 800 feet higher 

 than the general level ; broken ridges connect the peak with the circle 

 of hills that surround the general summit so as to form numerous 

 hollows, some of them dry, and under cultivation, but others forming 

 lakes, the largest of which is two miles in circumference. We know 

 little of the structure of this important feature in the physical geo- 

 graphy of India ; Mr. Low, to whom we are indebted for the particulars 

 above enumerated and who visited the mountain in 1835 in company 



