No. 4., RESEARCHES ON METEORITES— MERRILL. 15 



Weston, Conn. — Notwithstanding that this is the oldest known of American falls, it is de- 

 serving of more detailed study than it has yet received either from a mineralogical or chemical 

 standpoint. The work of Shepard (in 1809, 1846-1848) would natui-ally at this date be consid- 

 ered faulty. He described the stone as composed principally of howardite and olivinoid, with 

 scattered grains of magnetic pyrites and nickel-iron. Little advance over this seems to have 

 been made by subsequent workers, excepting Meunier, who, in classifying the stone as a limer- 

 ickite, recognized its chondritic character and mineral composition. Brezina classified it as a 

 spherical chondrite, brecciated, apparently without regard to its composition or microscopic 

 structure. The breccia-like structme is very evident, and is produced by angular pieces of a 

 light gray color embedded in the prevailing dark-gray material. The chondritic structure is 

 equally pronounced in both, and so far as can be determined by the unaided eye or a pocket lens 

 there are no essential differences between the two kinds of fragments other than that of color. 

 The mineral composition I find to be chiefly a pyroxene with a low angle of extinction, about 

 10°, which therefore relegates it to the clino-enstatite of Wahl, a polysynthetically twinned 

 pyroxene, olivine, "merriUite," nickel-iron, and iron siilphide. No feldspars, even in the form 

 of maskelynite, were observed. 



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