Records of the Geological Survey of India. 
30 
[vOb I. 
and portions of other bones as yet undetermined, have been found. Prom the evidence of 
the fossils, a ‘ Parisian’ age has been assigned to this series of beds.* 
The alluvium includes all the deposits which so extensively occupy the district, conceal¬ 
ing and covering up the above-mentioned rocks over the low ground and forming the mural 
precipices which edge all the larger streams at a little distance from the sea. 
It is almost universally composed of a fine light coloured argillaceous loam seldom 
pebbly or gravelly, and always formed from the decomposition of the local rocks. It some¬ 
times presents lines of stratification, hut more frequently is quite amorphous—its only 
characteristic being that like other Indian deposits of the kind, it contains numerous 
concretions of impure carbonate of lime (kuukur). Its quantity and depth are its most striking 
features, and the mass of it appears to be older than that forming the flats along the large 
rivers, but they pass so insensibly into each other that it is impossible to distinguish 
one from the other; its surface is frequently moulded into hillocks and vallies over small 
spaces bearing a very great resemblance to those of the Irish drift, but whether these are the 
results of mere atmospheric or other aqueous action it is difficult to say. 
Associated with this alluvium and generally passing beneath it are numerous beds of 
recent conglomerate with a calcareous cement, but even of these it is not possible to speak 
with cei'tainty as to age, for they appear to be in process of formation at present along parts 
of the coast, and their consolidation might take place at any time; some, however, are old 
enough to have been cut through by, ana to form in places the beds of, the rivers. 
Cotton Soil —covers the alluvium over many large tracts of the country, indeed it 
overlies it almost everywhere upon the open slopes as well as on the flats and in the hollows. 
It is often of considerable depth, presenting the usual desiccation cracks, but without any 
circumstances to throw additional light upon its source or formation. It seems in this 
country at least to be the ultimate result of the decomposition or recomposition of an 
alluvium largely made up of trappean materials; its colour may be due to decayed vegetation, 
or to iron or both, and its light loamy or compost-like character to the changes from wet to 
extreme drought, its great exposure to the influence of the air by means of the deep cracks, 
and its frequent distmbance by ants, &e., great quantities of -whose exeuviae it must contain. 
We will now proceed to give some detailed notes of the rocks in various localities, com¬ 
mencing at the north end of the district. 
In the country lying about Oolpar the rocks proper may be said to be wholly invisible. 
The country is covered by alluvium, and only changes its aspect along the sea shore where 
a belt of salt marsh and barren sandy ground washed by the high monsoon tides forms the 
coast. The Marries or streams for long distances inland are all salt, and efflorescences 
of the salts of soda and(?) alumina exude from the ground. In the Keem river at Elao and 
above that village near Sahol, there are hard white calcareous sandstones and breccias, some 
of which are worked into stones for hand mills at the last named villages. They belong to the 
upper part of the nummulitic series. Near Obah further up this stream the alluvium is worn 
through by the river exposing yellow limestone and soft yellow clay with ferruginous bands. 
These limestones occur again in the country to the north-east. More yellow limestone and 
sandstone with calcareous concretions and ferruginous layers occur: some of these beds are con- 
glomeritic in places and in others strangely cellular, with a knotted and angulo-concretionary 
* The following is a rough list of fossils procured from these beds, in the Tapiee river, a little below Bhodan, 
near the junction of a small stream called the Rhea. They have been identified by Dr. F. Stoliczka:— 
Jtoslellciria Presltvichii, D’Orb. 
Terebelhm , sp. 
CerWtiuiu, sp. 
CypiyBa (Cypraoml-n) elegans, Lam, 
NcUica longispira, Leym. 
Conus, sp. (near C. brevis, bat thinner), 
Trochus, sp. (like T. mitratus, Desli.). 
jPho/.as, sp. 
Fecten Hophinsi, D’Arch. and Haime. 
„ Favrei, D’Areh. 
,, comeus, Sow. 
I'ttheUa legumen, D’Arch. and Haime. 
The * bone fragments’ were portions of ribs, &c., 
Ostrea Flemingi, TV Art'll. 
„ lingua, Sow. 
Horner a, sp. (near IT. v emicosa, M. Edw.), 
Echinanfkm, (fragmonts). 
Cidaris, (spines). 
Fragments of other Frhinube. 
Stylocamui Vkuxryi, 51. Edw, and Haime. 
Troehoseris (1) 
TrocTiocyathus VandenbecMi, 51. Edw. and Haime* 
Nummulitesperforata, D’Orb. 
„ Brongniarti, D’Arch. 
„ exponens , or spira, (probably both), 
in a state sufficient for identification, 
