PART 3.] 
Ball: Building and Ornamental S/ones of India. 
121 
X.— Slates. 
For building purposes, more particularly for roofing, slates have not been much used 
in India, except in some of the stations of the North-West Himalayas. This is probably 
due to two causes, the first and principal being that in the oriental style of flat-roofed archi¬ 
tecture which is generally adopted for British buildings in India, slates could be only 
partially employed, and in the alluvial districts their place is amply filled by tiles. 
Secondly, most of the slates known to occur in India, are either non-cleavable, or, if 
cleavable, retain also their laminated faces. The laminated slates are difficult to work into 
sufficiently thin layers, and are not much used, as an undue amount of timbering becomes 
requisite to support the weight of slates of this character. 
At Dalhousie there are some large quarries in which there are slates and schists of 
various qualities. The best are said to be much more schistose than Welsh slates, still 
they are readily fissile, can be easily dressed, and can be obtained of considerable size. The 
fissile plains are in this instance parallel or nearly so to those of lamination. 
The slates in use at Simla* are, according to Mr. Medlicott, distinctly laminated, and 
in every way inferior to those obtained along the flanks of the Dhaoladhar, and which are 
Used at Dalhousie and Dhurmsala. 
Slates, the qualities of which are not so well known, are also obtained at Ferozpur, Pali, 
Chimnawar, and Sonah, all in Gurgaon, and at Attook, Abbotabad, and Spiti. 
At Chiteli, in Kumaon, occurs a slate which it was proposed to employ for roofing pur¬ 
poses at Ranikhet and other places. Mr. Hughes, comparing this slate with the Welsh 
standard, writes: “ It differs from the latter in splitting along the lines of lamination 
instead of the planes of cleavage. It is coarser in texture, more silicious (sandy), heavier, 
and has a duller ring on being struck.” The supply is ample for all possible requirements, 
and slabs of a foot square, j of an inch thick, can bo obtained easily. 
In the submetamorphic rocks (Bijaur series) of Chota Nagpur slates not uncommonly 
occur. In these the fissile planes are for the most part those of lamination. In Manbhum 
I met with a bed, however, which had most distinct cleavage structure, but there was also 
a tendency to split along the layers of lamination; thus, this rock breaks up into regular 
prisms at the surface, but it is not impossible that a good slate might be obtained, as the 
material is compact and dense. 
In Chaibassa the school-boys have only to run down to the stream near the town to 
obtain a new slate for doing their sums on. 
In the Karakpur Hills, near Monghir, slates have been extracted. 
The demand for slate is so small in Calcutta that I do not think it probable that these 
slates will ever be quarried to any large extent. 
In the Champanir beds between Soorajpur and Jumbooghora, north-east of Baroda, 
there are some slates which, as far as can be judged from their appearance at the surface, are 
considered promising by Mr. Blanford. 
In the Bijaur series near Bagh there are also slates which are not so fine grained as 
the preceding, but some of which might perhaps answer for roofing purposes. 
* Some of the slates which have been used at Simla for roofing temples are said to have lasted for hundreds of 
years. 
