PART 1.] 
Lydehlcer : Geoloyy of KasJmtr. 
19 
alleged superpositioB of the triassic limef?toiies on the Zoji-la slatesd Across the 
Zoji-la pass, however, owing to the great amount of contortion which the rocks 
have undergone, the sequence cannot be dearly traced, though I incline to think 
that the whole of the rocks between Baltal and Mataian are newer than the 
triassic limestone series. Beyond the Zoji pass, however, there occur on the 
road a few blocks of a gneissoid rock coming from the eastward, which may 
show that certain older rocks are throwm up by faults wdthin the presumed triassic 
area. I have no positive proof, however, that such is the case, and I do not there¬ 
fore desire to lay any gi-eat stress one way or the other upon the presence of 
a few' gneissoid rocks within this area. 
At Mataian there is a small fold in the white dolomitic limestones, and below 
this the same rocks continue with a southerly or south-westerly dip to the great 
bend in the Gumbar river. At this bend the triassic series is faulted ao-ainst 
o 
another great rock series, which has a northerly dip ; for a short distance below 
this bend the river runs along a faulted anticlinal axis, while further dowm the 
dolomitic series is continued to the eastw'ard a little to the south of the river : the 
dolomitic rocks have in this direction been traced a little to the eastward of Dras. 
The rocks^ to the north of this fault have a general blackish color when seen from 
a short distance, which contrasts most sti’ongly with the white colored dolomites 
to the south. These slaty rocks to the north and east of Dras are abruptly cut off 
by a great mass of crystalline rocks. These crystalline rocks are mentioned by 
Dr. Stoliezka in his “ Geological Observations in Western Tibet’’under the name 
of syenite, and are traced down the Suru river. In the latter area, according to 
Dr. Stoliezka, this rock contains large crystals of hornblende and diallage, wdth 
occasional nests of epidote and serpentine, together with grey quartz, and albite, 
and occasionally orthoelase. A rock of this composition is of eom-se rightly 
named syenite: at Dras, however, the composition of the rock appears to have 
changed; in hand specimens, which I collected, its constituents are quartz, browm 
uniaxial mica, and one or two kinds of felspar, and apparently no hornblende. 
The Dras rock, therefore, seems to be a true granite, and the same composition 
prevails in these rocks as W'e proceed to the east. 
A portion of the slaty rocks of Dras wms con.sidered by Dr. Stoliezka (sup. 
cit., p. 349) to be of silurian ago, while another portion was considered to be of 
■ There appears to be some confusion in Br. Stoliezka’s account of this section. At page 349 
of his “ Geological Obscn’ations in Western Tibet,” he obSciTes, “ these rocks (Zoji-la slates) 
are neglecting interruptions—by limestones and carbonaceous sliftes,” making no men. 
tion of the anticlinal in the limestones. At page 12 of the Geology of the Yarkand Mission, 
he observes that the limestones near Sonamarg have ‘ a northerly dip on the right hank of the 
valley,’ and immediately afterwards he says, that some four miles to the east on the same strike 
these limestones which dip towards the slates are underlaid by the slates, which is, so far, contra, 
dictory. In my last paper on Kashmir geol ogy (p. 45), I assumed from Br. Stoliezka’s first account 
that there must he inversion. Now that 1 have visited the spot, however, it appears to he a 
regular sequence, though somew'hat contorted, but a sequence which agi-ees exactly with the less 
disturbed one at Panjtarni. 
2 Mem. Geol. Surv. India, Vol. V, p. 347. 
