36G ANNUAL OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERY. 



masses had actually fallen from the heavens; but a closer investigation 

 into their character left little doubt that they were merely fragments of or- 

 dinary cinder, derived from a neighboring furnace, situated upon a stream, 

 whence gravel had ' been obtained for dressing the walks. Being in Shef- 

 field, in England, when the subject was undergoing investigation, I was 

 favored by Sir William Keith Murray, at whose residence the occurrence 

 took place, with an inspection of one of the specimens, and was satisfied 

 that a correct general view had been taken of their character. Nevertheless, 

 as the confidence of the gentleman referred to was full and entire in the 

 integrity of the witnesses of the phenomenon, it would seem to be an in- 

 stance in which the sulphurous matter of a shooting star was not com- 

 pletely consumed before reaching the ground, and that much of the residuum 

 suffered oxidation after it struck upon the cinder of the walk. 



My meteoric cabinet has contained for many years a few grains of a 

 mixture of carbonaceous and earthy matter in a pulverulent state, sent to 

 me in 1845 by Mr. Black, of Elizabethtown, Essex County, N. Y. (then a 

 member of the Legislature of New York), as having fallen in his wood- 

 yard during the winter of 1844 and 1845. Silliman's Journal, Sept. 1859. 



