'Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society, from September 1850 to June 1852. Edited by the Secretary. Volume X.' [‎192] (325/458)

192
OTOLOGY OF BOMBAY,
and standing a very high degree of heat without soffceningor warping:
all our other clays fuze at a red heat, and are most intractable as material
for pottery. It requires some forethought and preparation to procure it
in sufficient quantity for the potter ; and, wretched as is our other ma
terial, it seems never to have been thought of for pottery purposes, till a
large bed of the finer portions washed free of stones was deposited bv
the Monsoon of 1851 close by our School of Industry brick-field, and
its qualities thus became immediately known to us. On first being
exposed to the air, or subjected to cultivation, it refuses to sustain
vegetable life ; no plant whatever will grow upon it, and it remains
without vegetation during the wettest season when the rocks themselves
are almost green. With moderate manuring its character in a few
months’ time becomes completely altered,—the stony pieces disappear
from it, it changes its colour from red to brown, and becomes a fine
uniform unctuous soil, remarkable for its fertility: the alteration may
be effected in a few weeks’ time during the rains, and then it becomes
fertile in the extreme, each successive crop improving its qualities and
texture. It is greatly sought after by gardeners for mixing up with the
other more promising-looking, but in reality less productive, soils. In
the red earth large concretionary masses, from the size of the fist to that
of the head, or upwards, are frequently found, to all appearance aggre
gations of the earth itself. Externally they are glazed and of an even
texture : internally they are compact, corroded, and vesicular,—so per
fectly like the more ordinary varieties of laterite that it is difficult to
distinguish the one from the other,—the only difference betwixt
the two being, that the one is a shade more rusty in its tint
than the other. These concretions are often seen to all appearance in
the act of forming—they are much heavier and more compact than a
similar volume of red earth, and yield with considerable difficulty to
the hammer. Crystals of sileceous spar, and a curious variety of lami
nated quartz, are found embedded in the red earth ; I have not met with
any other trappean minerals it it, but then I have not happened to fall
in with specimens of the earth near any of the rocks in which minerals
abound.
37. Situation, — The red earth is always found on the surface of
trap, often in immediate contact with it, and enveloping it on all
sides, though there generally is a mass of rusty-coloured, or yellowish
l^er do w! b a]
jjoffochrey eart
is found in all sti
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ulurged. The
jlifaor merges in
iifests signs of d
prance of watei
if its appearance,
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