THE METEORIC PERIDOTITES. — SAXONITE. 89 



Later, Dr. Otto Hahn thouglit lie had discovered in this meteorite a plant form com- 

 posed of olivine. This plant he named Urania Guilicimi. It was regarded as lying 

 hetween algas and ferns.* Since Halm found his plants in granite, gneiss, serpentine, 

 basalt, and meteorites, even in the metallic nickel-iron from Toluca, and m that of the 

 Pallas meteorite, the conclusion would follow that he would be able to find them almost 

 anywhere. His language is such that it is difficult to believe that his paper is a sober 

 production, and not a parody on the Eozoiin literature, especially since he claims to have 

 found Eozoon structure in the Pallas meteorite. Perhaps this is not so remarkable, since 

 Carpenter found the same in graphic granite, t 



Whatever may have been Hahn's design in the publication of " Die Urzelle," he was 

 evidently in earnest in his " Die Meteorite (Chondrite) und ihre Organismen," Tiibiugen, 

 1880. 



This work is devoted chiefly to the structure of the chondri observed m the Knya- 

 hinya meteorite, and it gives very fair photographs of these. Hahn believed the 

 chondri were sponges, corals, crinoids, etc., while Urania was in this book placed under 

 the sponges. 



There are some things which pass discussion, and Hahn's works Ijelong to that class ; 

 for the kingdom to which such forms belong must be largely a question of belief rather 

 thaa of decisive evidence. The artificial formation by Meunier, of Hahn's sponges, corals, 

 and crinoids in a red-hot porcelain tube is perhaps the most decisive fact against their 

 organic origin. J 



The writer believes that this is one of the very common cases in which mineral forms 

 have been taken to be organic ones, especially by those who were familiar with the latter 

 and not with the former, — cases to some of which attention has been called in the 

 " Azoic System." § 



Later, Dr. D. F. Weinlaud continued the discovery of organic forms, principally in 

 the Knyahinya meteorite. He gives but two figures ; that of Pccliscns Zittdii is appa- 

 rently an enstatite crystal, and that of " HaJmia metcoritica, a coral ! " is evidently a series 

 of olivine grains. || 



These and other such fonns can be found in all chondritic meteorites, while almost 

 every rock, especially if altered, will afford structures that can be tortured into organic 

 forms, if the imagination or desire be strong enough. After this has been done, who 

 shall say that the authors were not correct ? Is not the case similar to that of the 

 Eozoon Canadcnsc — dependent solely on ivcif/ht of authoriti/ ? Yet the Eozoon occurs in 

 rocks proved to be veinstones ! 



The specimen of the Knyahinya meteorite in the Whitney Collection shows on the 

 fracture a gray color and a chondritic structure. 



Section : The sections show a gray chondritic mass, marked in places by a yellowish- 

 brown ferruginous staming ; and they are seen under the microscope to be composed of a 

 crystalline granular and chondritic mass, the parts often held by the dark-gray and light- 

 gray fibrous base and semi-base. The chondri in these sections are seen to be composed 



* See Die Urzelle, Tubingen, 1879, pp. 51-5G, and Plate XVII. 



t Nature, 1S76, xiv. 8, 9, 68. 



t Comptes Reudus, ISSl, xciii. 737-739 ; Am. Jour, Sci., 1882 (3), xxiii. 155, 156. 



§ Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., 1884, vii. No. 11. 



II Ueber die in Meteoriten cutdockten Tliicrreste. Esslingen, 18S2. See also Die hypotbetischen Orgau- 

 ismeu-Reste in Meteoriten, von Dr. F. lloUe, Wiesbaden, 1881 ; and Les Preleudus Organismes des Mete- 

 orites, par Carl Vogt, Geneve, 1 882. 



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