1844.] 



Syrian Church in China. 



£19 



" Three other minerals were found not yet analysed and reddish brown 

 oxide of iron in the veins with the barytes and or at least with rocks of 

 an age anterior to the lias, as galena does not usually occur in formations 

 less ancient than the new red-sand stone but extends downwards to beds 

 considered as primary. Mineral character is, however only one out the 

 four tests by which geologists determine the age of rocks and of which 

 superposition is the principal. The remaining tests are organic remains, 

 and included fragments of another rock the age of which is known. Mr. 

 Malcolmson found a fossil plant in the sandstone of Won in the Hydrabad 

 territory of a deep black colour ; and Lieut. Munro discovered fossil 

 plants in the sandstone of Nagpore resembling the glossopteris dan- 

 ceoides of the Burdwan coal field, figured by Dr. Royle in his 2d 

 plate which . was shown to me by Mr. Malcolmson at Bombay and 

 of which he has given an interesting account in No. 5 of the Bom- 

 bay Journal B. B. A. S. "With these plants impressions were found 

 which he thinks not unlike those of the large bony scales of the sauroid 

 fishes of the carboniferous and old red sandstone rocks, especially of the 

 latter. Mr. Malcolmson very properly adds, they are however too imper- 

 fect to justify any opinion as to their nature although in a subject so new 

 no indication should be overlooked. The Kurnool, Cuddapah and Nag- 

 pore limestone and sandstone formation is distinguished by a very strik- 

 ing mineralogical feature— that of the latter of these associated rocks 

 being the geognostic situs of the diamond. Owing to their connection 

 with and relative position to other rocks it is d point of great importance 

 to fix their age, wherein will be found a key to the geological chronology 

 of southern India. In connection with this interesting subject Z may add 

 that Dr. Walker of the Nizam's service has recently sent me specimens of 

 true coal discovered by himself in the limestone of the Hydrabad country. 

 The identity (which is very probable) of this limestone and the diamond 

 limestone of Cuddaph, and Kurnool still however, remains to be proved. 



The Syrian Church in China. — A French journal states, that "there 

 has lately been placed in the principal gallery of the Collection of M. S. S. at 

 Paris, an inscription in the Chinese and Syriac languages of the date 

 A. D. 781 showing the arrival of Syriac missionaries and propagation of 

 Christianity in China in the 7th and 8th Centuries. The inscription was 

 found in 1 825 in a city of China." 



Literary Gazette 



No. 1416. 



I 



