152 ROCHESTER ACADEMY OF SCIENCE. 



to-day to see an entire municipality join in giving serious credence 

 to popular tales which can but excite the pity, not only of physicists, 

 but of all reasonable people. What shall we say of this seriously 

 presented report, what reflections come to the philosophical reader 

 in perusing this evidently false attestation of a phenomenon 

 physically impossible." We find recorded no modification of un- 

 belief as to meteorites in France until 1803, when on the 26th of 

 April another great meteorite fall occurred at I'Aigle, in Normandy. 

 Then the Minister of the Interior sent the celebrated physicist, 

 Blot, to the spot to investigate. Biot did his work thoroughly and 

 his report presented on his return to the National Institute at 

 Paris, was overwhelming and conclusive as to the truth of the fall 

 from space of these stones, many of which he had brought back 

 with him. Thenceforth the extra-terrestrial nature of meteorites 

 has not been challenged in France. 



In the early part of the last century there are on record nearly 

 a score of meteorite collections. The Vienna Royal Cabinet, 

 which seems to have had its first meteorite in 1747, had, when 

 Schneider took charge of it in 1805, eight specimens. The British 

 Museum had in 1807 four or five specimens. Berlin Museum had 

 in 1810 about twelve specimens. The Paris (Jardin des Plantes) 

 Museum crowned the century with a 9 kilo Ensisheim presented 

 by Faucroy, an Elbogen and a Tabor, and in 1803 was materially 

 increased by numerous specimens of I'Aigle and of several other 

 French meteorites, so that it recorded early in the century nearly a 

 score of meteorites. These were, however, held for a long time in 

 the mineral collection without further classification. 



Previous to 1825 we find noted the existence of some 2^ or 24 

 public meteorite collections, notably in the cabinets of the Royal 

 Museums. There were also a considerable number of collections 

 of these bodies held by private collectors. The earliest of these 

 was that of Sir Charles Greville, which in 1810 passed into the 

 possession of the British Museum. That of Chladni, numbering 

 over 50 specimens, which at his death went to the Berlin Museum ; 

 and that of Born, which seems to have been distributed through 

 many museums ; Heuland, Neville, Sowerby, Klaproth, Bergman, 

 Rammelsberg, Reichenbach, Wuhler, the Marquis de Dace, the 

 Due de Luynes, and many others. We find record of meteorite 

 exchanges going on between these museums and between private 

 collectors as early as 1817, with the usual activities and rivalries. 



