816 Account and Destripilon of a Stone 



seen by some travellers on Movint-Ccnisi ; and he v.'a5 in- 

 t'ornied at the same time that it had iallen in the environs 

 of Villc-Franche under the form of an incandescent stone, 

 a small tVagnicnt of which was eent to him. 



" He assured me also, that a comparison he then made 

 of the periods at which the meteor had been observed on 

 Mount-Cenis, at Lyons, and at Villc-Franche, positively 

 announced that it was the san)e ball which had traversed 

 that line and shown itself in these three points. 



" I expressed to Dr. Petetin a desire of seeing the frag- 

 ment of this stone which he had in IviS possession ; and 

 the doctor, judging, no doubt, from the anxiety I showed 

 to obtain information respecting this phaenomenon, how 

 much I was interested in it, was so kind as to otfer me this 

 fragment in ease he should find it. 



" I was tlie more desirous, indeed, to see the specimen 

 of this mineral mass, as 1 had it in my power to compare 

 it with analogous specimens, one of which fell near Wold 

 Cottage, in Yorkshire, on the 13th of J")ecember 1793, and 

 another near Benares, in Bengal, on the IQth of September 

 1798, a fragment which I brought with me a few years ago 

 from Jjondon, where I received it from count de Bournon, 

 F. R.S., a verv celebrated mincralogjist. 



" Some time after J)r. i'ctetin sent me the fragnncnt in 

 question, and 1 was much sur[)vistd to find that it had a 

 perfect sinularity to specimens of those which fell at Be- 

 nares aiid at Wold Cottage ; a similarity manifest not only 

 m regard to the genus of stones but to the mineralogical 

 species which enter into their composition, and also in re- 

 gard to the eftects resulting from their movement in the 

 atmospheric fluid. 



" As the details which Dr. Fetetin was so kind &% to 

 transniit to me along with this \'aluable presc^nt gave me 

 reason to hope that 1 should be able to discover the exact 

 spot where this globe fell, and the circumstances atlendiug 

 its fall, I made researches iu the neighbourhood of Villc- 

 Franche, whicii were not fruitless ; for bv successively ac- 

 quiring more satisfactory inibrniation I was at length di- 

 rected towards the connnuneof Sales, at about the distance 

 ef a league and a half to the north-west of Ville-Franche, 

 in the department of the Rhone, v. here I learned that iiiost 

 lt>f the inhabitants had been witnesses of, and much fright- 

 ened by, the arrival of this luminous body, which had fallen 

 in a vineyard within three hundred paces of the village, and 

 near the house of a vintager named Pierre Crepicr. 



" 1 addi'essed myself to tvvu of the inhabitants best ac- 



(juainled 



1 



