116 
Records of the Geological Survey of India. 
[VOL. X. 
Upon the evidence of the arenaceous, argillaceous, and rarely gypseous layers below 
this Salt Eange limestone,* or the small local development of layers with an upper character 
at top, I can scarcely venture to assert that the whole group is the counterpart of the 
upper nummulitic beds of this district or elsewhere; still I think there mav be sufficient 
reason to suppose that similar conditions recurred at intervals, and that this Salt Eange series 
may at least be, generally speaking, newer than the greater part of the northern hill 
nummulitic limestones.t 
Nummulitic Limestones, Sfc., beyond the Indus. —I have so lately described these rocks, 
(in Vol. XI of our Memoirs,) where as yet I am best acquainted with them, that a short 
notice will suffice. The most striking and constant band is one of hard grey and often 
variously tinted pale compact limestone 60 to 100 feet in thickness. This in colour 
and texture has some resemblance to bands in the Salt Eange : it contains Nummtilites and 
Al oeoli-nce. Below it are other grey lumpy and sometimes eherty limestones, with various 
nummulitic fossils; some peculiar to this region, and none possessing the great size of 
some Salt Eange forms. 
Underneath these limestones there is a zone of deep rod clay, having subordinate 
sandstone and hsematjtic layers ; it varies from 1,500 to 400 feet in thickness, and in places 
contains small fragments of fossil bones. Locally this clay gives place to olive sandstones 
partly conglomeratic; greenish clays and impure limestones with Alveolince and Nmmmul- 
ites. This mixed group reaches a thickness of 100 to 350 feet. Below all are the alum 
shales, the massive layers of gypsum, gypseous days, and the enormous aeeummulation 
of rod:-salt, often distinctly and regularly stratified. In the upper part of the series there 
are appearances of alternation with some of the overlying purplish sandstones, &c., but 
the folding and inversion of the rocks is so intense over the district that appearances cannot 
be always trusted. 
The united thickness of the Trans-Indus nummulitic rocks, including 700 or 800 feet 
for the rock-salt and 300 for the gypsum, is estimated at from 1,600 to 1,700 feet, and may 
he more. 
There are points of resemblance between this series and that of the Salt Eange, but also 
many differences. Where the limestones are thick, pale, and fossiliferous, the resemblance is 
strongest; aud junctions between the limestone and overlying sandstones, though often 
locally resembling the sharpness and definition of the same in the Salt Eange. have here 
and there more similarity to the transitional nature of the newest beds of the whole 
uummrditic formation. The Trans-Indus nummulitic area has therefore general characters 
intermediate between those of the Salt Eange and upper nummulitic groups, and is most 
nearly allied to the last. 
The JJpper Nummulitic group of this country-, coming from the eastward, appears 
first in the Murree lulls, then passes westward, edging the outer Himalayan region, crosses 
the Indus at Bah tar, continues close along the south side of the Nilab Gash mountain, and 
leaves the district as a continuous zone to enter the Jawaki Affrfdi hills. A spur from these 
hills to Dandi on the Indus has beds upon its flanks which may belong to the group: it 
rc-appears, at KLiaire Murat ridge, deeply faulted into the Muds and mountains of the Hazara 
district north of Murree, and similarly placed in the Mfrkulan pass south of the Peshawar 
valley. 
* The coaly shales afiord no point ot comparison, no similar zone occurring in the upper nummulitics of this 
district, uor any band that could be safely referred to the same horizon among the northern hill limestones. 
t The East Salt, Range nummulitic group presents a must striking resemblance to the bottom beds of the 
nummulitic series throughout the Jamu hills.—II. 13, M. 
