] 06 Records of the Geological Survey of India. [vol. vil. 
In many of the ancient temples in Chutia Nagpur images made from this material are 
not uncommonly met with. 
The beautifully sculptured doorways of the Black Pagoda uear Pori are of this material, 
which was probably obtained from the Nilghiri Hills in Orissa. 
In some of the more finished temples at Bobaneswar there are large well polished and 
highly sculptured slabs of potstone let into the walls. (Stirling). 
In parts of Trichinopoli these rocks are applied to similar purposes. 
Soap-stone .—The very beautiful steatitic material so much used for delicate carvings in 
Agra, though genetically related to the rocks mentioned under the above head, seems deserving 
of separate notice in this enumeration. 
This rock is obtained in the territories of the Raja of Jaipur. In Agra it is chiefly used 
in the manufacture of small ornamental articles, but has not yet entered into use as a 
material for architectural decoration, although it is admirably suited to the purpose. 
Reference. 
Keene —On the Stone Industries of Agra. 
1Y.—Makble. 
Marble in India is better known from its great beauty in the few places where it does 
occur and its successful employment in the ornamental architecture of some of the cities of 
North-Western India, Rajputana, Guzerat, and a few other places, than from being gen¬ 
erally distributed throughout the country. 
The Taj at Agra which was erected by the Emperor Jehangir, to the memory of his 
favorite wife Nur Jehan, is built of polished white marble, and is by many competent 
authorities considered to be one of the most beautiful and perfect structures in the world. 
The material for this glorious monument, as well as for many others, was obtained in 
the Jaipur territories. 
But the special purpose to which the marble of Jaipur has been put, and for which it is 
so admirably' suited, is the manufacture of screens, the delicacy of the tracery on which can 
in many cases bo only compared with lace. This work is known by the name Jalee. Besides 
marble, sandstone is sometimes, however, employed for this purpose, as the following descrip¬ 
tion by Mr. Keene will show : “ It is a fine filagree of marble or sandstone fretted into 
an almost endless net-work of geometrical combinations, such as can only be understood by 
seeing the carvings themselves or good photographs of them.” 
In the opinion of Mr. Fergusson, the Jalee work of Ahmedabad in Guzerat is still 
finer; but the style of the two is quite different. 
According to Mr. Keene, the finest example of this form of work to be met with in 
Northern India is the following; he says: “But all the marble-work of this region 
is surpassed by the monument which Akber erected over the remains of his friend and 
spiritual counsellor Shekfi Suleem Ckistee at Fatipur Sikri (1681 A. D.). In the north¬ 
western angle of a vast courtyard 433 feet by 366 feet is a pavilion externally of white 
marble, surrounded by' a deep projecting dripstone, of white marble also, supported by 
marble shafts crowned by r most fantastic brackets shaped like tho letter S. The outer 
screens are so minutely pierced that they actually look like lace at a little distance, and 
illuminate the mortuary chamber within with a solemn half-light which resembles nothing 
else that I have seen. The whole of this elaborate work, including the strange but most 
pleasing design of the brackets, appears to have been produced by the resident stone-cutters 
