part 2 .] Stoliczka : Occurrence of Jade in the Karakatft Valley. 
53 
The BelakcM locality is, however, not the only one which yielded jade to the Chinese. 
There is no reason to doubt the existence of jade along the whole of the Kuenlun range, as 
far as the mica- and hornblendie schists extend. The great obstacle in tracing out the 
veins, and following them -when once discovered, is the large amount of superficial debris 
and shifting sand, which conceal the original rock in situ. However, fragments of jade 
may be seen among the boulders of almost every stream which comes down from the range. 
We also observed large fragments of jade near the top of the Sanju pass, which on its 
southern side at least mostly consists of thin-bedded gneiss and hornblendie schist. 
Another rich locality for jade appears to exist somewhere south of Kotan, from whence 
the largest and best coloured pieces are said to come; most of them are stated to be ob¬ 
tained as boulders in a river bed, though this seems rather doubtful. Very likely the Chineso 
worked several quarries south of Kotan, similar to those in the Karakash valley, and most 
of the jade from this last locality was no doubt brought into Kotan, this being the nearest 
manufacturing town. A great number of the better polished ornaments, such as rings, &c., 
sold in the bazaar of Yarkand, have the credit of coming from Kotan; possibly they are 
made there by Chinese workmen, but the art of carving seems to have entirely died away, 
and indeed it is not to be expected that such strict Maliomedans, as the Yarkandees mostly 
are, would eagerly cultivate it. If the Turkistan people will not take the opportunity of 
profiting by the export of jade, or if no new locality of that mineral is discovered within 
Chinese territory, the celestial people will feel greatly the want of the article, and good carved 
specimens of jade will become great rarities. The Chinese seem to have been acquainted 
with the jade of the Kuenlun mountains during the last two thousand years, for Kotan jade 
is stated to be mentioned* “by Chinese authors in the time of the dynasty under Wuti 
(B. C. 148—86).” 
Yarkand, 14 th November 1873. 
Notes from the Eastern Himalaya. 
While Hr. Stoliczka is applying his palaeontological master-key to discover the secrets of the 
rocks of the Kuenlun, on the extreme north-west of the great Tibetan mountain-area, investi¬ 
gations of scarcely less interest are going on at the south-eastern base of the same, in the 
Sikkim and Bhutan Hoars. It may indeed be said that the geology of the remote and in¬ 
accessible regions of the Himalaya have for some time been better known to us than that of 
the nearer ground to the south of the great suowy range. A series of well-known formations 
have long since been identified beyond the passes; while the rocks of the broad belt of mountain 
region to the south of the main range have remained indeterminable. Nummulitic rocks have 
been locally found along the southern fringe of that belt, corresponding stratigraphically to the 
Flysch of the Northern Alps. And upon very scanty fossil evidence it has been conjectured 
that the limestone of the outer ridges in the Simla region are triassie; but for the rest all 
is darkness. There is, of course, a very good excuse for this in the highly metamorphosed 
condition of the strata in the greater part of that region, and in the sterility everywhere 
in fossil remains—difficulties which greatly enhance the value of any promising clue lo a 
solution of the lpystery. 
From the point of view of local geology this state of ignorance has been specially 
depressing. That same nummulitic formation—crushed and upheaved on the outer fringe of 
the Himalayan region, and resting undisturbed upon a deepty denuded surface of the great 
* Yule’s Marco Polo, Vol. I, p. 177, 
