214 



Notes 071 Geological Specimens from 



where the bard nuclei were surrounded by layers of a grey friable wacke 

 like that of the Nirmul hills, and are curiously divided into compart- 

 ments by tufaceous partitions. Near to this, the blue limestone is again 

 found in extensive slabs, slightly raised from its horizontal position ; 

 but as usual in no regular direction, the strata occasionally meeting 

 each other at an obtuse angle. The same remark applies to the rock as 

 seen to the north of the springs on the road to Won,, and to almost 

 every other place where I have met with it. Near the last mentioned 

 bed of basalt, some irregularly inclined strata of blue rock, having a 

 granular sandstone-like aspect, were seen, and at no great distance, 

 large loose masses of vesicular scorise were found. 



But the most interesting appearances are seen, in a small irregular 

 rising ground, above the pagoda at the principal spring. The basis of 

 the rock is a tough white limestone, projecting from the gentle rising 

 ground in very irregular masses, passing into curious and beautiful 

 jasperous minerals, often coated with minute rock and other crystals ; 

 and the whole is perforated by large cavities, and even holes, evidently 

 formed when the rock had been erupted in a semi fluid state. Much 

 tufa is associated with these altered rocks, filling up many of the cavi- 

 ties, and having various minerals imbedded. 1 believe that few places 

 exhibit so many of the most interesting effects of volcanic action, as the 

 small district around Eair; more especially in altering a stratified rock 

 of apparently uniform stucture, so as to form a great variety of mine- 

 rals*. A good deal of sandstone has been used in the old buildings* 

 which the inhabitants stated to be brought from Sacra, five miles to the 

 west. 



To the north of Kair, the limestone resumes its blue colour; the soil 

 is black, and a little further on, mixed with calcedonies, &c. In the 

 nulla at Won, quartz sand, sandstone, and a mineral resembling pud- 

 ding-stone ere picked up ; and at the foot of the hill, the remarkable 

 vegetable fossils figured in the fifth number of the Madras Journal, and 

 now deposited in the museum of the Bengal Society. The small hill 

 of Won is composed of sandstone of different colours, red, white, and 

 yellow, and waved lines of a black colour from disseminated iron, pass 

 through it in various directions — the composition of which is the same 

 as that in which the fossil is contained, and the sandstone from between 

 Urjuna and Kair. The strata have been elevated by the convulsions 

 to which the rest of the district has been subjected, and have a dip 

 from the apex of the hill, varying from 35 to 55 degrees : their direc- 

 tion on the southern face of the hill, is nearly from E. to W., but to 

 the west they turn off towards the rising ground on which the town is 



* In some specimens, the surface has the appearance of a semifused brick, which had 

 assumed something of a regular arrangement, -whilst the centre is composed Of the blue 

 imestone little altered. 



