1901.] BREZIXA — COLLECTIONS OF METEORITES. 211 



THE ARRANGEMENT OF COLLECTIONS OF 

 METEORITES. 



BY DR. ARISTIDES BREZIXA, VIENNA. 

 Late Director of the Mineralogkal Department oj the Natural History Museum at 



Vienna. 



(Read April 8, 1904.) 



In making a collection of any kind of matter two ends 

 must be kept in view; firstly, to secure in due time and to 

 preserve as great and complete a variety of the material as 

 possible, and secondly, to illustrate as fully as possible all 

 ways in which the matter may be considered. 



According as a collection provides for the first or the second 

 purpose it is called a systematic or a synoptical collection. 



Until 1889 there existed meteorite collections of the first 

 kind only; in this year the new Natural History Museum of 

 the Court at Vienna was to be opened; and as for a hundred 

 years this collection had been worked upon by Chladni,. 

 Schreibers, Widmanstcitten, PartscJi, Haidinger, Homes, Wohler,. 

 Tschermak and myself, most of its specimens from different 

 localities had been investigated, structurally and chemically 

 so thoroughly, that 'I could for the first time divide the 

 material into ten great series. ■■ 



They were disposed as follow^s: 



I. Ancient coins on which sacred meteorites were repre- 

 sented. 



II. Historical meteorites which were worshiped by primi- 

 tive nations or which formed standards in the development 

 of meteoric science; related bodies, as fallen dust, bloody 

 rain, meteor-paper, nuclei of hail and pseudo-meteorites. 



III. Specimens of meteorites which show processes of melt- 

 ing, incrustation, cleaving and faulting, black and metallic 

 veins, etc., (celestial alterations); and the results of experi- 

 ments on meteorites for producing similar alterations. 



IV. Specimens showing terrestrial alterations, viz., defor- 

 mation by falling on the earth, erosion of the surface by 

 terrestrial agents, chemical alteration after the fall, forma- 

 tion of new constituents by humidity, etc. 



V. The constituents of the meteorites,, from simple minerals 



