October i, 1887,] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
281 
GEOLOGY OF CEYLON. 
A correspondent, evidently a new arrival, asks 
us about a work to consult on the geology of 
the island. He is specially interested in the 
Jaffna Peninsula, where red soil resting on a 
coral base has puzzled so many observers. Our 
correspondent has a theory ae to the origin of 
this soil, which we shall not anticipate him in 
stating. It differs from received opinions. We 
must ask our correspondent to accept a reply 
through the columns of the Observer, which 
may bn of some use and interest to others also- 
There is no separate publication on the 
geology of Ceylon, and wo can but repeat the 
hope so frequently expressed by us, that ere 
long a member of the Indian Geologioal Survey 
— one of the most extended and most complete 
in the world, and the results of which have 
been embodied in three separate manuals, th 0 
latest of which, on the gem minerals has just 
reached us, — that an officer who 1ms gained 
experience in the course of this survey may be 
borrowed to examine aud report on the geology 
of this island. 
This first real attempt to describe the geology 
of Ceylon was made by Dr. John Davy, a brother 
of the celebrated philosopher, Sir Humphry 
Davy, and himself an accomplished scientist. 
He served here on the medical staff in the 
early part of the century and embodied his ob- 
Berva ions on ouv rocks and minerals and min- 
eral waters in a paper contributed to the trans- 
actions of the British Goological Society. He 
subsequently included it, with such improvements 
and additions as we deemed necessary, in his book 
on the interior of Ceylon. Of course the science 
of geology has greatly advanced in the sixty 
years which have elapsed since Davy wrote, 
especially in - a knowledge of the laws which 
have producod and are still producing the 
metamorphic rooks, but although Davy's theories 
have been improved upon in some respects and 
a good many additions made to the facts re- 
corded by him, his observations on the rocks 
and minerals of Ceylon have formed the ground- 
work of nearly every attempt made since then 
to give an idea of our geology and mineralogy. 
Our correspondent will feel the truth of this 
statement, if, after reading the chapters on the 
subject in Davy's book, he subsequently peruses 
those in Pridham's work (a boiling dowu of previous 
works on Ceylon and so of considerable value,) 
and in the book on Ceylon by an officer of the 
Ceylon Rifles, a book o( which it may almost 
be said that it "fell stillborn from the press." 
The Rov. Dr. Macvicar, the first Chaplain of 
the Scotch Church m Ceylon, made some interest- 
ing observations on the geology of Ceylon, but 
the lirst and only attempt to givo. in a separate 
paper, a comprehensive account of the geology 
of our island was made by Dr. George Gardner, 
Superintendent of the Peradcniya Gardens. The 
paper forms an appendix to the lute Mr. George 
Lee's translation of the French version of lti- 
beiro's account of Ceylon, published at Colombo. 
Sir J. Emerson Tenncnt, in writing his groat 
work on Ceylon, besides having access to all 
previous works had tho advantago of personal 
36 
intercourse with Macvicar, Gardner and other 
observers in systematizing the results of his 
explorations. In addition to all this he availed 
himself of the results of a partial survey and 
reports made by Dr. Gygax, a Swiss scientist 
who happened to be in the island and was em- 
ployed by Lord Torrington's Government. The 
result of the whole is a very interesting sum 
mary of tho geology and mineralogy of Ceylon 
in what is still (lie great book on Ceylon, 
although Tennent, over-sanguine about a theory 
which would have beon grand had it been w< 11 
founded instead of wild and baseless, allowed 
himself to be misled by Gygax (himself in 
some inexplicable manner deceived) into asserting 
the presence, in connection with millions of ton- 
of iron ore, of anthraeito in such quantity that 
it could be laid down in Colombo at 18s per 
ton ! It became the duty of the writer of this 
article, in preparing for the transactions of the 
local Asiatic Society the fullest and most complete 
account of tho mineral graphite or plumbago ever 
yet written, conclusively to show that no trace 
of anthracite is to be found in Ceylon, while 
all the probabilities are against coal in any shape 
existing in our formations. Let our correspondent 
observe the caution thus given, in reading the 
latest attempt at summing up the main fayts 
in the geology of this island, contained in tho 
account of Ceylon given by Mr. J. P. DicksoD in 
the new edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica. 
Scattered in various periodi als, especially in 
the transactions ef tho local Asiatio Society, 
are a number of interesting papers by Dr. 
Kelaart on upcountry laterite, by the lata Mr. 
Oswald Brodie on salt formations, and, of 
special value a more complete and more correct 
list of the minerals of Ceylon than that of 
Gygax, by Mr. Alexander Dixon. This recent 
and careful observer saw no trace of coal in 
any shape, although ho noticed s'ight indications 
of tin and copper. As yet, however, our only 
economic mineral of cons< quence is plurubigo, of 
which in its purest carbon form the island has 
almost a practical monopoly. Dr. Trimtn, in a 
paper on the botany of Ceylon, glances at some 
interesting theories counected with its old-world 
geological history. — In a compilation of artie'es 
from the Ubsrrver and other source, " All about 
Gold and Goms," a new edition of »"hioh is 
about to be published at the Observer Office, 
there is a mass of information about the. mineral 
wealth of Ceylon in the mountains, plains and 
marine banks of the island. — In this sketch we 
have not, of course, included all fugiti e articles 
or chance writers on the geology of Ceylon, and 
we were about to claim that we thought we 
had omitted no work or writer of importance, 
when we recollected he " Circular Notes " of 
that most accomplished but perhaps somewhat 
imaginative geologist, the late Mr. Campbell of 
I slay. 
Such generally being tho imformation avail- 
able, we may add that the accepted the rv is 
that the dynamic forces which originally raised 
Ceylon "from out the azure main" are still 
at work, and that a slow, very slow process of 
upheaval is going on. We oannot tell what 
the rocks are "all the way down," or to the 
centre of our globe, but our obvious foundation 
rock is primitive granite. It is not only our 
lowest but our highest formation, for it has in 
some places beon so projected as to form the 
rooky domes and pinnoole9 of nature's temple 
on our mountain tops. Granite, grey and red, 
with porphyry and sieuile, ocoa«ioually OCCDi 
amongst our most prevalent formation, gucUc 
