20 
Reconh of iJie Geological Surveg of India. 
[voL. XII, 
carboniferous age; no fossils were, however, discovered. We shall subsequently 
see that these Dras slates are the equivalents of the Pir Panjal rocks of Kashmir, 
and therefore appear to be the equivalents mainly of the Silurians, though there is 
no reason why some of their higher beds should not be carboniferous. The same 
rocks may be traced in a south-easterly direction to Kurtse, where they overlie 
the gneiss of Suru. 
Kear the town of Dras itself the slate series has generally a very massive 
character, showing at a short distance but very indistinct signs of stratification; 
the rocks consist mainly of brown or purple sandstones, and black, brown, green, 
and brick-red slates and shales. To the westward of Dras, the same rock-series 
is continued up the Muski stream, with a generally northerly dip; a little to the 
south of the same stream, we may trace the bold line of cliffs of the triassic 
dolomites, which have a generally westerly trend, and the same southerly dip 
which we observed at Dras. Westward of Dras many of the rocks in the slate 
series consist of light colored ribband-jasper, and there are also numerous beds 
of conglomerate intercalated with the slates. The pebbles in this conglomerate 
ar-e sometimes water-w'orn and sometimes angular, and do not generally exceed 
four inches in their longest diameter; they consist of quartzites, gi-its, and slates, 
some of the two latter of which are veiy similar in character to the main rock. 
The occurrence of pebbles in these rocks similar to the matrix, may perhaps be 
explained in tbe manner in which Sir Charles Lyell explains a similar feature 
in the Stonesfield slate of England he there suggests that the pebbles in the 
conglomerate, which resemble the main rock, may be portions of the same deposit 
which have been broken up in shallows and re-deposited. The rocks may, 
how'ever, have been altered before the formation of this conglomerate. 
About twelve miles above Dras on the Muski river, a few thin bands of 
limestone occur in the slate series; nearer the pass, at the head of the river, black 
slates and conglomerates are the prevalent rocks. 
As we approach the pass separating the Dras and Kishenganga valleys, blue 
limestones begin gradually to appear at the top of the slate series (which has 
a southerly dip), till finally at the pass itself these blue limestones form the 
greater poi'tion of the higher part of the series; still further to the south these 
blue limestones are overlaid conformably by the buff dolomitic limestones con¬ 
tinuous with those south of Dras, in which Dr. Stoliezka found triassic fossils. 
We therefore find that at the head of the Muski stream a very different 
condition obtains to what we found at Dras; at the latter place we found a fault 
separating the Dras slates from the triassic dolomites, while in the former place 
the two series are connected by an intervening series of blue limestones, the 
-whole being apparently conformable. The inference from this is firstly, that the 
fault which occurred at Dras has here died out, secondly, that the intermediate 
blue limestones belong approximately to the carboniferous series, and thirdly, 
that the Dras slates belong approximately to the silurian series. The carboni- 
> Btudfiit’s Elements ol Geology, p. 323. 
