PHYSICAL ASPECTS
on its western bank. Its whole course is to the south with a westerly
trend, and it forms the great natural waterway of the Province. Into it
flow the mountain streams of Hazara, the Unar, Siran, Dor, and Harroh,
on the eastern bank; but these are insignificant compared with its
western tributaries, of which the chief are the Landai and Kurram.
The former joins it at Attock and the latter below Isa Khel.
The Landai, by which name the Kabul and Swat rivers are called
below their junction, drains Kohistan, Swat, Dir, Chitral, Tirah, and
Peshawar District ; but these vast territories have but a small rainfall,
and, as much of the water is used for irrigation, it is nowhere a great
river. Its principal tributaries are the Chitral, which rises in the Hindu
Kush ; the Swat, which rises in the hills north-east of Buner, and after
receiving the waters of the Panjkora joins the Kabul river at Nisatta
in Peshawar District; and the Bara, which drains Tirah and falls into
the Kabul east of Peshawar city.
The Kurram, rising in Afghan territory on the southern slopes of the
Safed Koh, passes through the Kurram valley and the lower Wazir hills
into Bannu District. Three miles below Lakki it is joined by the Tochi
or Gambila, which drains Northern Waziristan.
The geology of the North-West Frontier Province exhibits consider-
able diversity. The northern portion of Hazara and the hills on the
north-north-east border of Peshawar are built up of crystalline, igneous,
and metamorphic rocks, comprising chiefly a massive micaceous gneis-
sose granite (sometimes containing schorl and garnets), as bands or
sills among thin-bedded mica-schists and phyllites, much entangled
with each other, and laid out in parallel flexure waves one behind the
other. The axis of the folding of this zone is about north-east to
south-west. In Hazara a probably younger set of less metamorphosed
sedimentary strata borders this zone on the south, consisting of a group
of arenaceous and calcareous rocks known as the Tanawals, which are
infra=Trias in part. It seems probable that the granite is older than
the Trias and possibly than the infra-Trias. All these formations are
somewhat sparsely invaded by a plexus of basic dike rocks (dolerites)
of still later age.
The middle portion of Hazara is mainly composed of a very great,
highly inclined, and irregularly cleaved slate series, sometimes graphitic,
and very occasionally calcareous, in thin bands. It is probably very
ancient-certainly older than the infra-Trias, from which it is separated
by a striking unconformity. No fossils are known in it, and its base
has never been recognized. The series outcrops in a westerly direction
to Attock, where it is well exposed in the river section; and from there
it continues to form the north half of the Cherat hills, and parts at least
of the Peshawar valley near Naushahra. The slates and crystalline
limestone (marble) near.Attock and Naushahra are worked with some
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