GEOLOGY. 
17 
tic beds occur; and, in these, sections of Dicerocardium ILimalayense are not uncommon. 
In other places beds are met with full of Crinoid stems. North of the Lingzi-thung plain— 
to the west of which the hills are mostly composed of the same triassic limestone—a red 
brecciated, calcareous conglomerate is seen at the foot of the Compass-la, but this conglom¬ 
erate gradually passes into the ordinary grey limestone, which forms the ridge, and un¬ 
doubtedly belongs to the same group of triassic rocks. The last place where I saw the 
triassic limestone was just before reaching the camping ground Shinglung: here it is an 
almost white or light grey compact rock, containing very perfect sections of JdlGcjcilodon 
triqueter , the most characteristic triassic fossil. On Mr. Eorsyth’s route Dr. Bellew 
met with similar triassic limestones on the northern declivities of the Sasser pass, and also 
on the Karakoram pass, overlying the carboniferous shales and sandstones previously 
noticed. On the Karakoram the triassic limestone contains spherical corals, very similar 
to those which were a few years ago described by Professor Bitter von Beuss from the 
Hallstadt beds in the Alps, and which are here known to travellers as Karakoram stones. 1 
Beturning to our Lingzi-thung route, we leave, as already mentioned, the last traces 
of triassic limestone at Shinglung, in the TJpper Karakash valley. Here the limestone rests 
upon some shales, and then follow immediately the same chloritic rock which we noticed 
on the Lankar-la, alternating with quartzose schists, both of which must be regarded as 
of upper palaeozoic age. 
At Kizil-jilga regular sub-metamorphic slates appear, alternating with red conglom¬ 
erate and red sandstones ; and further on dark slate is the only rock to be seen the whole 
way down the Karakash, until the river assumes a north-easterly course, some fourteen 
miles east of the Karatagh pass. Erom here my route lay in a north-westerly direction 
towards Aktagh, and the same slaty rock was met with along the whole of this route up 
to the last-mentioned place. Dr. Bellew also traced these slates from the northern side of 
the Karakoram to Aktagh. They further continue northwards across the Suget-la, a few miles 
north of the pass, as well as in single patches down the Suget river to its junction with the 
Karakash. The irregular range of hills to the south of the portion of the Karakash river, 
which flows almost east and west from Shah-i-dula, on its southern side entirely consists of 
these slates, while on the northern side it is composed of a fine-grained syenite, which also forms 
the whole of the Kuenluen range along the right bank of the Karakash river, and also is the 
sole rock composing the hills about the camping ground at Shah-i-dula. The slates of which 
I spoke are, on account of the close cleavage, mostly fine, crumbling, not metamorphic, and 
must, I think, be referred to the silurian group. They correspond to the metamorphic 
schists on the southern side of the Karakoram ranges. 
Thus we have the whole system of mountain ranges between the Indus and the borders 
of Turkistan bounded on the north and south by syenitic rocks, including between them the 
silurian, carboniferous, and triassic formations. 2 This fact is rather remarkable, for, south 
of the Indus, we have nearly all the principal sedimentary formations represented, from the 
silurian up to the eocene, and most of the beds abound in fossils. 
The only exception to which I can allude on the Changchenmo route is near Kium, in 
the Changchenmo valley. Here there are on the left bank of the river some remarkably 
1 We are still somewhat in the dark as to the true nature of these curious fossils. Dr. Waagen considered them allied to some 
sponges (Astylospongia) described by Professor Ferd. Rdmer from Tennessee and from the Silurian pebbles in the drift of Silesia, and 
certainly the resemblance externally and on cut sections is very great, hut hitherto no spicules have been detected in the Karakoram 
stones. The specimens have now been sent to Europe for identification. 
2 On his subsequent journey from Yarkand, Dr. Stoliczka found that the highest portions of the Karakoram pass consist of 
liassic rocks (Tagling). See concluding portion of Geology, p. 45. 
