12 
SECOND YABKAND MISSION. 
them subsequently.] Passing the village Malshabagh (near Gandarbal), I saw a sub- 
recent conglomerate, which was deposited fully 50 feet above the present level of the lake, 
and in places it was overlain by terraces of clay (level), which seemed to reach about 30 
to 50 feet higher. 
7 th, Kang an .—The rocks on both sides of the road are the same as about Srinagar— 
the green plutonic rock, often with zeolite cavities, and sometimes not to be distinguished 
from greenstone. In other places it is distinctly stratified, and it is probably a meta- 
morphic silurian or devonian rock. 
8th to 12th , Kangan to Sonamarg .—[No mention of any geology on the road.] The 
triassic limestones come almost down to the valley about three miles before reaching 
Sonamarg. At Sonamarg they are in some parts rather slaty and thin-bedded: I got no 
fossils in them. They dip north and south on the right and left bank of the valley re¬ 
spectively. 
13th, JBaltal .—About four miles east of Sonamarg, schists below the limestones occupy 
the greater heights, particularly on the north, and they extend in a north-easterly direction 
along these heights. At Baltal all the rocks are these schists, which are probably carboni¬ 
ferous. They often contain carbonaceous bands full of crystals of iron pyrites. 
14th, Mataian. —[Crossing the Zoji-la, 1 11,800 feet.] The schistose beds, which are in 
places almost mica schist, are followed, a couple of miles north of the Zoji-la, by more 
carbonaceous beds, which are probably true carboniferous, and then, about a mile south of 
Mataian, they are overlain on the right and left bank by the usual thin-bedded triassic 
limestones. These are sometimes quite white and dolomitic, alternating with black and 
earthy beds. I saw several Khynconella and sections of large bivalves, like Megalodon 
and Kicerocardium, and small oysters ; but nothing sufficiently determinable. [Eurther exa¬ 
mination of the beds near the Zoji-la has shown that there is inversion, and that the rocks 
at the crest of the pass are of later age than the triassic limestones seen on each side.— 
Lydekker, Bee. G. S. I., XI, p. 45.] 
15th, Mataian .—I looked over the limestones near the village, but found no determi¬ 
nable fossils. 
16th, Kras .—About three miles after we left Mataian the green rocks cut off the 
limestone on the left bank, and for a few miles the boundary between the two rocks runs 
in the valley. After about the seventh or eighth mile, the base of the valley is all of 
green rock, which is generally quite massive, like greenstone; only occasionally it is thinly 
bedded with bacillary structure. To all appearance they are the same rocks as about 
Srinagar. About two or three miles before reaching Dras, the green rocks cross over 
entirely on to the right bank, and extend in a north-easterly direction, the trias limestones 
keeping to the heights. At their contact with the green rocks the limestones are more 
slaty. North by west of Dras the green rocks decompose very readily, and weather out 
reddish, as greenstones often do. About the camping ground numbers of syenite rocks 
are strewn about. The whole plain about Dras is filled with a deposit of shingle to about 
a hundred feet above the level of the river. 
17th, Tashgaon .—Eor some distance from Dras the rugged, barren hillsides consist 
of greenstone. This rock gradually passes into a greenish syenite, with large quantities of 
schorl; but on both sides of the valley there is still the green rock in situ : higher up on 
the left bank is syenite. 
1 La, a pass Tibetan. 
