part 3.] Wynne: Tertiary zone and underlying rocks in N.-W. Punjab. Ill 
westward across the Indus to the Kohat frontier. It includes the whole of the Rawalpindi 
plateau, or “ the Potwar,” a name strictly belonging to an eastern portion of the plateau, but 
sometimes used even by natives of the country in a more comprehensive sense. 
This ground, having an area of about 7,000 square miles, forms an undulating expanse 
edged by the northern slopes of the Salt Range, and lies about 1,000 feet higher than 
the alluvial plains and desert south of that range. It appea-rs analogous to the Duns 
of the Southern Himalaya, and is in reality one of the most strangely broken tracts I have 
seen, intersected by numberless deep, ramifying ravines called “ khadera, ” the rapid 
extension of which is attested by the isolated remnants of the neighbouring “ maiddn ” 
(or plain) included amongst them. The heads of all the streams not in the hills issue 
from such a fretwork; and along the larger water-courses, though wide flats of auriferous 
sand and quicksand form their lower levels, ordinary alluvial border tracts are rare. 
From this plain or plateau rise a few reefs of hare rock, often only narrow, jagged, 
vertical walls, and one more considerable mural ridge called “ Khaire Mfirut” (over twenty-two 
miles long and reaching to 1,500 feet above the adjacent country) runs west-hy-south from 
the neighbourhood of Rawalpindi. 
The Murree hills, twelve to twenty-eight miles distant from the same station in an oppo¬ 
site direction, culminate in heights of over six, seven, and eight thousand feet, declining in 
successive nearly parallel ridges towards the direction of Jhelum cantonment. They have a 
general south-west north-east trend, which is also that of most of their numerous, some¬ 
times sinuous, axes of contorted stratification, the folds being most compressed northwards. 
All the ridges are united by a zigzag subordinate backbone, forming the Cols, and rudely 
conforming to the adjacent course of the Jhelum. 
Ridges at their eastern ends parallel with these, then bending more to the west, form high 
mountains immediately north of the Murree hills. Towards the plateau they decline ; and the 
Grand Trunk Road passes through gaps near their western termination at the Margala Pass. 
Beyond these again rise the Hazara hills, and the fine range of Gandgarh partly bordering 
the Upper Indus. 
From the Margala pass two ranges run westward south of Attoclc; gaining in eleva¬ 
tion they unite to form the lofty Affridi hills overhanging Kohat; then passing south of the 
Peshawar valley they culminate in the Khybur mountains and Sufcd Koh of Afghanistan. 
The most southerly of these, called the Chita Pahar, edges the Rawalpindi plateau on the 
north. 
In the Kohat district the part of the ground under notice presents a series of long 
ridges, closely clustered, running more or less east and west, often crooked and of varying hut 
not insignificant height. Viewed from the plateau, they assume the appearance of a con¬ 
nected range. The valleys between these are for the most part rugged; but some flat cul¬ 
tivable patches enhance the sterility of their generally treeless surroundings. A few high 
summits occur near the Indus, and the whole cluster lies between the Afghan hills and the 
Shingarh chains to the south. 
The Salt Range which edges the Rawalpindi plateau southwards and is sinuously 
prolonged Trans-Indus, in both places presents wild and mostly unfertile tracts. Cis-Indus 
it forms a precipitous escarpment overlooking the “Thai” (or desert) and lower plains. 
Further west, with numerous disturbances and dislocations, the northern inclinations of its 
strata rise to steeper angles, and the stronger beds support a mass of tertiary rocks, whose 
deeply serrated outline, Trans-Indus, and the silvery sheen of its hare sandstone summits, 
betray the presence of the upper tertiary series, making the Pushtu name Shingarh as 
suggestive in its half English sound as in its vernacular meaning of “ Grey mountains.” The 
