small fragments of flint or
other hard substances which the waters find in their way. Where the
floods which cover the surface during the rains come in rivers,
flowing from the Himmalaya or other hills abounding in limestone
rocks, they of course contain lime and carbonic-acid gas, which add
to the kunkur nodules formed in the bed below; but in Oude the rivers
seldom overflow to any extent, and the kunkur is, I believe, formed
chiefly from the lime already existing in the bed.

Doctor O'Shaughnessy, the most eminent chemist now in India, tells me
that there are two marked varieties of kunkur in India--the red and
the white; that the red differs from the white solely in containing a
larger proportion of peroxide of iron; that the white consists of
carbonate of lime, silica, alumina, and sometimes magnesia and
protoxide of iron. He states that he considers the kunkur to be
deposited by calcareous waters, abounding in infusorial animalculae;
that the waters of the annual inundation are rich in lime, and that
all the facts that have come under his observation appear to him to
indicate that this is the source of the kunkur deposit, which is seen
in a different form in the Italian travertine, and the crescent
nodules of the Isle of Sheppey and of Bologne.

Doctor O'Shaughnessy further states, that the _reha_ earth, which I
sent to him from Oude, is identical with the _sujjee muttee_ of
Bengal, and contains carbonate of soda and sulphate of soda as its
essential characteristic ingredients, with silicious clay and oxide
of iron. But in Oude, the term "_sujjee_" is given to the carbonate
and sulphate of soda which remains after the silex has been removed
from the reha. The reha is fused into glass after the carbonic acid
and moisture have been expelled by heat, and the sujjee is formed
into soap, by the addition of lime, fat, and linseed oil, in the
following proportions, I am told:--6 sujjee, 4 lime, 21/2 fat, and
11/2 ulsee oil.

The sujjee is formed from the reha by filtration. A tank is formed on
a terrace of cement. In a hole at one corner is a small tube. Rows of
bricks are put down from one end to the other, with intervals between
for the liquor to flow through to the tube. On these rows a layer of
stout reeds is first placed, and over them another layer composed of
the leaves of these reeds. On this bed the coarse reha earth is
placed without being refined by the process described in the text
above. Some coarse commo