PART 3.] 
Medlicolt, Shapur Coal-field'. 
67 
deficient; and although I gave 500 feet as a possible thickness for the alluvium, I certainly 
expected rock to be struck at a less depth ; thus the borings were not begun on a sufficient 
scale for such a depth where piping had to be used throughout. 
There was nothing whatever for a positive opinion that the superficial deposits would 
be so deep. The Narbada flows on the north side of this broad plain; and within com¬ 
paratively short distances throughout its course it touches rock, leaving the valley through 
a narrow rocky gorge 100 miles to west of, and at a level about 200 feet below, the surface at 
Gadarwara. This gorge is the lowest lip of the rock-basin of the actual valley; for the 
watershed on all sides is on rock. Wo have thus at least learned from this Sukakheri boring 
an interesting geological fact regarding the depth of the pleistocene valley. 
A complete prognosis of the case would involve also the consideration of yet another, 
great valley of excavation in the same area, but regarding which our information is still 
more obscure. The valley occupied by the pleistocene deposits was to a great extent cut out 
of the great trappean formation, which had filled up a previous valley to the full level of the 
highlands on the north and south. Both to east and west of the Sitariva bedded trap is, at 
several places, the last rock seen passing under the alluvium at the south side of the valley. 
Locally, too, it is underlaid by thin fresh-water deposits supposed to be of upper cretaceous 
age. That pre-tertiary valley to some extent corresponded with the existing feature, being 
principally bounded by the Vindkyans on the north and the Mahadeva hills on the south ; 
but it is improbable that its line of discharge was the same as that of the present Narbada. 
Regarding its possible relative depth there is no certain clue; but there is nothing to suggest 
its having been great in the Sitariva region, older rocks being seen at many places to east 
and west. There were some symptoms that the boring at Sukakheri was approaching a 
bottom of this kind ; the last samples of clay brought up were much charged with granules 
of iron oxide as if from a lateritic layer which is frequently found coating the trap. 
The discovery of the great depth of the sui-faco-deposits at Sukakheri is, no doubt, a 
check to our hopes of finding the coal-measures within easy reach in this neighbourhood, and 
may therefore divert the press of exploration to other points ; but, of course, the question of 
the existence or not of the coal-bearing rocks in this position is quite untouched. The argu¬ 
ment on this point stands just as at the beginning; and unless before long coal is found 
under more favorable conditions elsewhere in this Satpura region, I would certainly recom¬ 
mend the prosecution of the search here. The actual position might be shifted to Gagavola, 
a village a mile and a half south of Sukakheri. I went clear to the north in first choosing 
a site, to avoid coarse gravels in the covering deposits near the hills, and to get well beyond 
a known region of disturbance in the coal rocks, should they be found. 
Exploration 
region. 
the hill- 
The other class of exploration is directed to find the coal-measures within the known 
rock basin. On the south side of the basin the outcrop of the 
measures is nearly continuous from east to west. The hope of 
finding them on the north side is based upon the single outcrop 
on the Sitariva, and upon the fact that very generally they are closely associated with the 
Talchirs, and these are found at several places along the north boundary. The reasonable 
conjecture is, that the coal may be more or less continuous throughout the whole basin, 
beneath the covering Mahadeva rocks. For a short distance west of the Sitariva the Talchir 
rocks, and even the coal-measures, are traceable; their manner of disappearance in this direc¬ 
tion is not seen; the nearest section is very obscure and greatly affected by trap dikes. 
In the first complete Section exposed, in the Dudhi and east of it, younger rocks occupy 
the whole ground up to the boundary with the metamorphies. When next the lower mem¬ 
bers of the series come to the surface along the boundary, the Talchir group alone is found, 
overlaid by younger rocks than the coal-measures, the latter being completely cut out , or 
1 overlapped.’ 
