Whatever the country may have been previously, one might explain its present appearance by supposing it to have consisted of a tolerably level extent of conglomerate, with here and there a strip of soil in the lowest part of each portion, and that the elevation of the mountain ridges was of subsequent occurrence:  this would account for the formation of the lower slopes, and the frequent isolation of small eminences of the same character as the neighbouring mountains.  It will account for the appearance of the conglomerate in every ravine until the top of the culminating point is reached.

As the mountains were elevated, portions of conglomerate would be detached, and these resting again on all suitable places, would account for the existence of conglomerate on certain parts which are flatter than usual.

Whirlwinds are common about Cabul, commencing as soon as the sun has attained a certain degree of power.

In all cases they assume the shape of a cone, the point of which being a tangent on the earth’s surface:  the cone varies in shape, is generally of a good diameter, occasionally much pulled out, some being 2,300 feet in height, the currents are most violent at the apex.

They come and go in all directions, even after starting, not always preserving the original direction.  They are less common on days in which winds prevail from any given direction, and vary much in intensity from a mere breeze, lightly laden with dust and with no tortuosity, to a violent cone of wind, capable of throwing down a soldari.

Northerly winds are prevalent here from 1 or 2 P.M. until 8 or 9 P.M., occasionally they only commence in the evening, when they are obviously due to the rarefaction of the air of the valleys by the great heat of the sun, amounting now to 100 degrees at 3 P.M., and the vacuum being supplied by gusts from the high mountains to the north and north-east.

CHAPTER XVIII.

From Peshawur to Pushut.

January 8th.—­At Ichardeh.  Between Busoollah and Lalpoor are three curious low ridges, none above sixty feet high, and all of small extent; they are covered with fractured masses of rock of the same size as those strewn so liberally about the shingly slopes; but they are much cleaner or fresher looking, and appear to me less worn.  Whence do they derive their singular situation?  They occur in such numbers, that one would at first think they originated from a mass of ruins, but the ridges present scarcely any surface for buildings to stand upon, certainly not to such extent as would account for the abundance of these fragments.