‘Military report on south-west Persia, including the provinces of Khúzistán (Arabistan), Luristán and part of Fars.’ [‎197v] (399/470)

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( 2 )
valley is composed are red gravel and sandstone. Upon these rest conform
ably c olid beds of limestone, which rise to the summits of the mountains
around forming the sides of the basin. The dip of the whole series is 8 8 SO'
The following is a section from the top of the great cliff at the foot of
which our camp was situated (see fig. 5) :
(1) Limestone-breccia, derived from the underlying beds, and cemented
in a yellow calcareous matrix.
(fig. 5, Grey compact limestone, sometimes of a light slate
colour ; fracture saccharoidal, emitting a bell-sound when struck
with the hammer; surface rough, weathering in deep and laige
holes as if bored by gigantic lithodomous mollusca. It contains
a few oslrea, pecfines, echini, casts of centhia, and univalves,
which, however, it is impossible to extract, owing to the flinty
hardness of the rock. In the upper layers are huge tabular masses
of opaque, white, and dark-brown flint.
( 3 a) Thick bed of very hard, compact, somewhat argillaceous, light-
grey limestone, with fossils similar to the above.
( 3 a) Compact greyish-yellow limestone; the lower portion in very
thin layers. Fossils very rare.
( 3 &) Very hard gravel conglomerate, in a deep-red argillo-calcareous
matrix ; the pebbles consist of highly indurated, dark-red, and dull-
green clays and cherts, mixed with a few of dark-blue limestone and
yellow sandstone ; the fragments of chert and clay being small and
much worn by transport.
Yellowish and reddish sandstone, with thin and regular layers
of the above pebbles, which are most frequent in the upper part of
( 3 )
(4)
( 5 )
( 6 ) (:
the bed.
( 7 ) ( .^) Blue, grey, or fawn-coloured limestone, exceedingly hard, com
pact, and heavy, containing nummulites 'perforata (small variety),
N. (AssHina) exponens, Orbitoides dispansus, Alveolina subpyre-
naica, with a few spines and broken shells of Echinoderms. This
bed passes into the following—
( 8 ) (gd?) Bluish-grey rock, consisting of nummulites, &c., cemented in
carbonate of lime, and containing the same fossils as occur in bed
No. 7 : interspersed are a few layers of fragile grey marl.
By barometrical measurement, our camp on the gravel conglomerate (bed
No. 5) was 1,951 feet below the summit edge of the overhanging cliff. I he
above section, therefore, cannot be less than 3,000 feet in height. I regret
that I am unable to give the thickness of the several beds; but the nature
of the cliff renders measurement quite out of the question.
From the presence of an ostrea (sp. undet.) in the limestone No. '2, and
also at the head of the Tauk-i-Gfrrah Pass, in connection with the gypseous
deposits, there is reason to believe that the bed No. 2 lies near, if not quite
at the top of the nummulitic rocks. It is just possible that it may represent
the fossiliferous marls of the gypsum series discovered at Karind, since the
forms of the contained fossils appear to be nearly allied, although casts such
as these are always difficult to identify.
The beds Nos. 7 and 8 were well exposed in the sides of a deep ravine,
formed by a mountain torrent in the basin of Mungerrah, which afterwards
forces its way through a difficult gorge to join the Balad-Rud river. Large
blocks of this shell conglomerate, literally composed of Nummulites perforota
and N. exponens with Alveolina subpyrenaica, lie in the channel of the stream
t