212 
On the Sandstone of India. 
[July, 
of English geology. Here then I take my stand, and I call upon any one who 
attempts to describe the sandstones of India, to point out the coal measures and 
mountain lime, with its characterstic fossils, above or below them. We may remark 
here, as an instance of the deceptive nature of mineral characters, as guides in 
classing rocks, that the passage to granwacke, which he cites as characteristic 
of the Old Red , and which has usually been considered as decisive of it, belongs, 
as we see from his next paper, to the Caithness schist, which schist he considers 
as equivalent to the coal measures ; though there is great doubt whether they are 
not to be referred higher. He concludes, “ If the rocks of the Arran section 
were assumed as the general type of all contemporaneous deposits, there would 
be then no objection to a classification attempted by some geologists, wherein all 
the rocks of the orders above described, are considered as belonging to one great 
formation of sajidstone , to which the carboniferous series is subordinate and 
“ we think this classification may have its advantages in comparing the contempo- 
raneous deposits of remote regions.” To this remark I lend my humble assent, 
and propose to call ours “ The great sandstone," or “ Red sandstone of India," 
at least until we know something more about it. He adds, in conclusion, what 
I have before stated, that “ want of conformity is not an element which will assist 
us in grouping together, or separating contemporaneous deposits in different parts ot 
the earth,” See instances, in proof of this, in his Paper on Magnesian Limestone, 
note p. 39. I must not be understood as having asserted, that it is not possible to 
identify the New Red Sajidstone by its internal characters. I believe that it is; 
and I should cite, from the paper just quoted, some of the leading characters of 
its great divisions, as a proof that it might be so. First then let us see, the 
marl slate, with its peculiar fossil fish, or the magnesian limestone, with its 
mineral characters well marked, and its suite of fossils, or the red marl and 
beds of gypsum, its constant attendants, or the red marl with beds of rock salt 
and gypsum. Not a saline soil, not brine springs, because, as this formation 
appears to be of no great thickness, the brine springs might belong to the 
primitive rock beneath. 
I must not omit here, that there are some circumstances about this formation, 
which though far from decisive, lead us to conjecture that we ought to assign it 
an earlier place than the New Red. In the first place the transition rocks, (and I 
include under that name, the carboniferous series of Conybeare,) have been found 
to be more universally distributed over the globe in association with the primin' 0 
rocks than the secondary' ones. I agree with Captain Franklin, that the sandstone 
which extends to Rajhmal is probably only a continuation of this formation ; a ®d 
I will go a step farther and say, that all the detached sandstone formations which 
are to be met with in the primitive range, between the Soan and Hooghly, are pro 
bably only outliers from it. We have reason to believe that the Bundelkund f°r 
mation contains coal ; and coal has been proved to exist in many of these detached 
basins ; see for localities Gleanings, No. 19, Art. “ Palamow Coal.” Between 
Rajhmal and Bancoorah, on the eastern flank of the range, consists a formation of 
carboniferous sandstone , probably little inferior in extent to that of Bundelkund- 
Regai ding, then, these detached pieces as belonging to one formation, we may 
urge, in the second place, that it contains coal. Thirdly, we state its constant 
association with the primitive rocks. New Red also does rest upon primitive rocks ; 
but an association so constant as this can hardly be said to be without weigh > 
especially if we recollect that the primitive rock is more usually a syenite or syem- 
tic granite, than an earlier member of that formation ; and syenite is next in sac- 
cession to the rocks of the carboniferous series, and is not unusually connects 
