78 
[VOL. TV. 
Records of the Geological Survey of India. 
mentioned, could scarcely escape the notice of any observer. I have already briefly alluded to 
the general distribution of these rocks, so far as the Central Provinces are concerned, and 
shall not therefore delay further than to refer to the labours of Malcolmson, Newbold, Grant, 
Carter, Hislop, Medlicott, Blanford, &e., for more detailed discussions of this extraordinary 
series, which extends, or has extended, certainly over an area of 10 degrees of latitude by 
15 to 16 of longitude. “ The area covered by them in the Peninsula of India can be little 
“ fcss than two hundred thousand square miles.” Their limited extent within the bound¬ 
aries of the Central Provinces is therefore but a very small fraction of their entire area. 
Of deposits later than the trappean rocks there is a great variety and an immense area. 
These would include all the soils of the present sur- 
Post-trappean deposits. face with their numerous modifications and varying 
agricultural value. 
Laterite occurs in detached areas in Sagar and adjoining districts; it covers a consi¬ 
derable space in the north-east of Jabalpur district, and is found at intervals passing to 
the south in Chanda, where it covers extensive areas in the eastern and north-eastern 
portions. It presents all the usual characters of this deposit, but nowhere within the Central 
Provinces attains that great thickness and massiveness which admit of its being freely used 
for building purposes. 
The older gravels and clays of some of the river valleys would appear to be next in 
_ , succession. These have been the object of more 
Tertiary conglomerates. „ •' . 
careltil study, ou account of the numerous remains of 
large animals, as well as ordinary shells, of which some of the beds contain locally in large 
number. The largest continuous area of these ossiferous gravels aud clays is found in the 
Narbada valley, along which they extend in unbroken continuity for more than a hundred 
miles from the falls of the ‘ marble rocks’ near J abalpth- to below H oshango bad. They 
also occur in the hanks of the river both above and below these limits. Very similar depo¬ 
sits are found forming the banks and often the beds of the upper feeders of the Godavari'— 
the Wardhii, Painganga, &c.—and in the Godavari itself; and here also they locally 
contain a large number of bones, sub-fossilised, the remains of animats which existed at 
the period of their deposition. The valleys of these streams are, however, by no -means so 
well defined as that of the Narbada, and the limits of the ossiferous gravels and clays are 
not easily fixed. The gravels are for the most part cemented into a conglomerate of toler¬ 
able hardness by the infiltration of carbonate of lime, and these beds might not imfrequently 
be mistaken for conglomerates of greatly older date on a cursory examination. There is, 
however, one fact which enables them to he readily distinguished, and that is the abundant 
presence in them of rolled pieces of the trappean rocks—of numerous agates, pieces of 
bloodstone, &c., which at once prove them to have been post-trappean in their origin. The 
immense variety and abundance of these pebbles also abundantly indicate the vast denuda¬ 
tion to which the trappean rocks have been subjected since their outflowing and deposition. 
In general character these deposits in their lower portions consist of gravels and sands, 
_ , frequently, as mentioned, cemented together much 
Ossiferous gravels. . , 
m the same way as a concrete is, and sometimes so 
hard as to be quarried for building. Towards the base the clays become sandy and pebbly. 
Sandy beds occur even in the clays, aud irregular deposition and oblique lamination (false- 
bedding) are frequent—indeed so frequent as to be almost the normal condition. It is not 
easy to arrive at any just conclusion as to the thickness of these deposits. Actual sections 
of more than fifty feet in thickness are occasionally met with, but twenty to thirty feet are 
the more ordinary limits. The greater portion of the deposits is generally clay, the coarser 
beds being chiefly confined to the portion near the base. Fossil hones are not generally 
