PART 1.] 
Annual Report for 1876 . 
Oil the south-west extension of the Sub-Hiraalayan series Mr. Blanford, assisted 
by Mr. Fedden, accomplished a good season’s work on the tertiary deposits in Sind. A 
preliminary sketch of these formations, from the previous season’s field-work, was published 
by Mr. Blanford in the Records for 1876 (p. 8). The most important addition made to the 
geology of Sind since the date of that report consists in the discovery of cretaceous rocks 
(a Hippurite limestone) at the base of a group of beds underlying the Ranikot or infra- 
nnmmulitic group. Several very important facts concerning this group have also been ascer¬ 
tained ; its upper limits and the division between it and the overlying Kirthar group have 
been better defined, and very large additions have been made to the fossils obtained from it. 
Mr. Fedden during the recess season in Calcutta has made a very useful preliminary classifica¬ 
tion of these collections in the Museum. It has further been definitely ascertained that the 
basalt of Ranikot is intcrstratified with the sandstones and shales of the Ranikot group; 
and a bed of basaltic rock, apparently the same, has been traced at intervals to Jakhmari, 
a distance of over 20 miles. This basalt is on the horizon assigned for the Deccan trap. 
Older roelcs .—Early in 1876 Mr. Blanford made an important trip across the desert 
east of the Indus, through Umarkot and Balmir to Jodhpur, and back through Jesalmir to 
Rohri. We have thus gained most interesting information regarding a great area of 
western Rajpootana that has hitherto been almost unknown. The journey did not quite 
extend to the gneissio and slate rocks forming the centre of the Arvali region. The 
oldest formation observed on the inner zone consisted of peculiar porphyroid rocks ; a prevail¬ 
ing type being a dark compact silicious felsite with disseminated felspar crystals and quartz, 
associated with syenitic and granitoid varieties. They are locally much disturbed. Mr. 
Blanford supposes these Malani beds to be altered volcanic rocks.* He does not liken them 
to any he has seen elsewhere in India ; but it may be worth recalling that peculiar felsitic 
beds have been described in the Kadapah and Gwalior formations, and even in the Lower 
Vindhyans of the Sone valley. 
Upon these rocks, in the neighbourhood of Jodhpur, there rest quite unaltered and very 
little disturbed a considerable thickness of rusty sandstones, at the base of which Mr. Blan¬ 
ford doubtfully places a very peculiar contiguous deposit of fine shales with large boulders, 
which suggest the action of ice, the supporting rock having, moreover, exhibited in one 
place a smoothed and scored surface. A Vindhyan horizon is suggested for these deposits, 
and the specimens are certainly most of that type ; otherwise one might risk the conjecture 
that they may be lower Gondwanas, and that the boulder-bed represents that of the Talchirs. 
The relation of the Jodhpur sandstones to the next formation on the west has not been 
defined, the two not having been observed in proximity; but the unconformity must be total, 
as the succeeding deposits, withiu a small distance, also rest upon the Malani felsitic series. 
They consist of brown and white sandstones in which silieified wood and other plant 
remains are frequent. The fossils of these Balmir beds are not identifiable, but the rocks 
have a strong Gondwana aspect, and may safely be reckoned as such, being closely related 
to the overlying marine jurassic rocks of Jesalmir, consisting of alternating sandstones and 
limestones. 
The marine jurassics of Jesalmir are transgressively overlaid on the west by a nummu- 
litic limestone, identical with that of the Kirthar group, as seen at Rohri on the Indus. All 
the infra-nummulitic and cretaceous beds of the trans-Indus section are thus totally over- 
* I notice a contemporaneous description of very similar rocks of palaeozoic age in Australia as altered volcanic 
products. See Mr. Brough Smith’s Report of Progress of the Geological Survey of Victoria, No. Ill, p. 190, 1876. 
