362 ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



Iron, ^. 99-790 



Nickel, with a trace of cobalt, .* -140 



Magnesium, 0-022 



Calcium, 0-121 



Silicium, 0-075 



100-143 



About a year after I had examined the mineral from Knoxvillc, I received 

 the same substance from northern Alabama, as an alloy of gold, platinum, 

 silver, copper, etc., with the request to advise a plan for the separation of 

 these metals. 



I have endeavored to obtain more of this interesting substance from both 

 localities ; but the parties, probably not being satisfied with the results of my 

 examinations, did not comply with my request; and I hope others may be 

 more successful than I have been. 



ON AN EXAMINATION OF THE MATTER OF A SUPPOSED SHOOTING 

 STAR THAT FELL ON THE EVE OF NOVEMBER 16TH, 1857, AT 

 CHARLESTON, S. C. BY PROF. C. U. SHEPARD. 



t 



In calling attention to the matter of a shooting meteor, I am conscious 

 that the evidence of its genuineness is not absolutely perfect; nevertheless, 

 it falls so little short of entire satisfaction, as to make it fully worthy of 

 notice. No instance of the kind at least has yet been recorded, entitled to 

 so much confidence. 



Mr. S. R. Scriven, a clerk in a dry -goods store in King's Street, Charleston, 

 was the principal observer of the phenomenon. He returned to his resi- 

 dence near King's Street, in Charleston, at half past eight, on the evening of 

 Nov. 16, 18-57, when he saw a red, fiery ball, of the size and shape of an 

 orange, slowly descending through a distance apparently of twenty or 

 thirty feet, to the ground. Its fall was scarcely more rapid than that of a 

 soap-bubble, giving him time to call his sister, a little girl, to see it strike 

 a high wooden fence, distant about fifty or sixty feet from the portico, 

 and which separated the door-yard from a church-enclosure adjoining. It 

 seemed to adhere for an instant to the board against which it struck, and 

 then separated into three parts, and disappeared. The evening was dark, 

 it having followed a rainy afternoon, though at the time of the fall, it had 

 ceased to -rain and become very foggy. 



Nothing further would probably have been heard of the phenomenon 

 but for the accidental reading, by an elder sister the next day at the break- 

 fast-table, of a paragraph from a newspaper, relating to a meteoric fall, 

 where the specimens picked up were said to have possessed a strong odor 

 of sulphur. This induced young Scriven, who had never before heard of 

 meteoric falls, at once to examine the fence against which the ball had 

 struck. The fence was eight feet high, and formed of long strips of hori- 

 zontally disposed boards. It was near the extremity of an uppermost 

 board, that had been detached and bent around so as to present its flat side 

 uppermost, that the body had been seen to impinge. And here it was that 

 he discovered adhering a small bristling mass of black fibres. These he 

 detached and carried into the house. As it had rained again during the 

 night, he was led to suppose that the rest of the matter had been washed 

 away. He searched the ground among the dead grass, but not until after 

 the second night, when much more rain had fallen. He could find no more 



