PART 4.] Waagen; Geographical (lislnlution of fossil organisms in India. 295 
2. Of the triassic period unequivocal marine beds occur in the Himalaya, but 
only to the north of the first crystalline zone, in Hazara, in the Salt Range, and in 
the opposite dii’ection in Burma. All other bods are deposits from inland 
waters, with numerous plant-remains. 
3. Marine beds of the Jurassic aud of the lower cretaceous periods occur in 
the Himalaya north of the first crystalline zone, in the Salt Range, in Rajputana, 
and in Kachh. Sandstones containing marine fossils mixed with plant-remains 
show themselves to the west and north of Madras and in the lower Godavari 
valley. The remaining Jurassic beds are depo.sits from inland basins without 
marine fossils. The basaltic eruptions commence dui’ing this period. 
4. Marino beds of the u^jper cretaceous period occur iu the Himalaya, and 
doubtfully in the Salt Range. They occur also iu the Suliman Mountains and in 
Sindh, also in the basin of the Nerbudda, in the neighbourhood of Trichinopoly, 
aud finally in the Khasi hills. All the other cretaceous bods are deposits from 
inland basins. The basaltic erujjtions continue. 
5. In the eocene peiiod the marine nummulitic beds extend again from the 
west as far as the Jumna. They cover the whole of Western India, are indicated 
at the mouth of the Godavari, extend north-westward up to the Garrow hills, and 
stretch all through Burma to the mouth of the Irawadi. Of the inland basin 
deposits only a few of the intertrappean beds can be here included. The basaltic 
eruptions cease about this period. 
6. The Siwalik beds are entirely of fresh-water origin, and marine deposits of 
this period are known only in Southern Sindh, in the neighbourhood of Kui’rachi, 
and ^Jerhaps in Kachh and Kattiawar. 
I have endeavoured to rexiresent graphically, on the little map annexed, some 
of the facts put forward in the above statements, and have indicated by lines tho 
boundaries of the marine deposits of different epochs. On consideration of these 
boundaries, it will be seen immediately that India is a fragment of a very old 
continent whose existence extends back into probably palaaozoic times, but whose 
limits varied much at different periods. The most remarkable fact in connection 
with this is, that during the greater part of the mcsozoic period, the first crystal¬ 
line range of the Himalaya still lay within the boundary of the continent, so that 
one would bo almost inclined to consider this range as the old coast range of the 
former continent. Tho same thing holds good with regal’d to the Arvalis, which 
also form a dam between the regions of fresh-water and marine depositions. 
The extent of the continent was, like its boundaries, a very variable one. 
Nearly every palaeontologist who has studied carefully the geographical distribu¬ 
tion of animals will have been led to the conjecture of a once existent great 
continent in the southern hemisjihere of our earth, as many facts can only be 
tolerably explained by the assumption of such a continent; I need only recall 
“ Lemuria,” and H. 1'. Blanford’s “ Indo-Oceanic Continent.” It has, however, not 
yet been attempted to connect such a deduction with iiarticular geological facts, 
but zoo-geographical observations were relied upon in the first place, and the 
choice of geological arguments was not exactly a very happy one. 
