1836.] 



A ' eelgiierries and Koondahs. 



297 



granite) of England, to have fallen out in the same manner as those of 

 hornblende in the rock of Makoortee. 



Let me now mention two or three localities in the south of Europe, 

 which I have visited, where the rock, although different in nature, pre- 

 sents cavities similar to those of England and Makoortee. 



The magnesian limestone of Greece, and of many of the Grecian 

 islands, has, in more than one locality I have seen, the same kind of 

 erosions as we have described ; they are of large size, many feet in cir- 

 cumference, of a circular form, smooth as if polished, some of them being 

 situated at the edge of rocks, like indentations- 



These appearances I have witnessed in many of the mountains of 

 Epirus : but most clearly in that of the Pandocratera, the highest in 

 Corfu (the principal of the Ionian Islands), being entirely analogous, 

 to those in the mountains of Greece. I have also seen the same phe- 

 nomenon in the Zechstein, near Palermo (Sicily), and on the very sum- 

 mit of Monte Pellegrino. Speaking of this last locality, I do not mean 

 the small perforations mentioned by Daubeny, Christie, Hoffman 

 and Lyell, as found in all the mountains, which, like amphitheatres, 

 rise behind the rich and lovely plain of that capital, and which evi- 

 dently have been produced by perforating marine animals (Lithodomi). 

 "What I allude to are large, smooth cavities, some of them many feet hi 

 circumference, resembling, when not in the side of the rock, large mor- 

 tars. They appeared to me perfectly similar to some of those of Ma- 

 koortee, and, I am convinced they were produced by the same process^ 



The above described are the rocks I had an opportunity of examin- 

 ing on the Neelgherries, having met none of the secondary, and much 

 less of the tertiary class. It would appear from this, that the eleva- 

 tion of this plateau, and probably of the whole chain of the western 

 ghauts of which the Neelgherries are the southern termination, happen- 

 ed at a period long anterior to the existence of life on our planet. 



It is for this reason that I think Humboldt's opinion not supported 

 by facts, when he says, " the chain of the Ural, the Baloor tag, the 

 ghauts of the Malabar Coast, and the Vringckan are probably more 

 modern than the Chains of the Himalaya, and the Teenckan"*. We 

 know, that in the Himalaya, at several thousand feet elevation, and on 

 the declivities of the highest ridges themselves, organic remains have 

 been found in limestone, which seems of the age of the carboniferous 

 group. 



The nummulitic limestone of ChiraPunji, and the conglomerate rock, 

 which forms the DehraDun at the foot of the Himalaya, appear to assi- 



* Edinburgh Philosophical Journal, October to January, 1832. IIoibolut on tl_e 

 Mountain Chains— Volcanoes of Central Asia, 



