Fall of Meteorites at the Cape of Good Hope. 391 



The sulphuret of latanium may be produced by heating the oxide 

 strongly in the vapour of oxide [sulphuret ?] of carbon. It is of a 

 pale yeUow colour, decomposes water with the evolution of hydro- 

 sulphuric acid, and is converted into a hydrate. 



The oxide of latanium is of brick-red colour, which does not ap- 

 pear to be owing to the presence of oxide of cerium It is converted 

 by hot water into a white hydrate, which restores the blue colour of 

 Utmus paper reddened by an acid; it is rapidly dissolved even by 

 very dHute acids ; and when it is used in excess, it is converted into 

 a subsalt. The salts have an astringent taste, without any mixture 

 of sweetness ; the crystals are usually of a rose-red colour. The 

 sulphate of potash does not precipitate them, unless they are mixed 

 with salts of cerium. When digested in a solution of hydrochlorate 

 of ammonia, the oxide of latanium dissolves, with the evolution of 

 ammonia. The atomic weight of latanium is smaUer than that as- 

 signed to cerium ; that is to say, to a mixture of the two metals 



M. BerzeUus has repeated and verified the experiments of M. Mo- 

 sander.—L'Institut, 14 Mars, 1839. 



FALL OF METEORITES AT THE CAPE OF GOOD HOPE*. 



" On the morning of the 13th October, about nine o'clock, a fall of 

 stone« (of which a specimen is herewith sent) occurred in the Bok- 

 keveld, about fifteen miles from Tulbagh, attended with the most 

 awful noise, louder and more appalling than the strongest artillery, 

 causing the air to vibrate for upwards of eighty miles in every du-ec- 

 tion. Indeed it was felt from the Cape Flats to the edge of the 

 Great Karroo, and again from Clan WiUiam to the river Zonder- 

 end, near Swellendam. The noise was awful ; and by those in the 

 immediate neighbourhood of the spot where the stones fell, is de- 

 scribed as something similar to the discharge of artillery, by those 

 at a greater distance as rocks rolling from a mountain; which was 

 the sensation at Worcester, some forty miles from the chief site of 

 the phenomenon. Many felt a curious sensation, especially about 

 the knees, as if they had been electrified. At the time of the occur- 

 rence I was on the very skirts of its influence, on the edge of the 

 Karroo, in company with the Hon. Mr. Justice Menzies. At the 

 moment of the explosion I witnessed a volume of the electric fluid 

 forcing its way from the west in the form of a Congreve rocket ; it 

 exploded almost immediatclv over my head, into apparent globules 

 of fire, or transparent glass.' Throughout the region of the pheno- 

 menon the air was highly charged with the electric fluid, especially 

 the night prior to the fall of the stones ; the mountains around 

 Worcester and the Bokkeveld being in one continued blaze of light- 

 ning, and some of the inhabitants described the fire as rising from 

 the earth. The stones (the quantity I have not been able to ascer- 

 tain, but supposed several cwts.) fell in the presence of a farmer, 

 who had with him a Hottentot, who stood so near the shower as to 

 become perfectly insensible for some time, either from the electricity 

 or from the effects of fright. The stones fell in three spots, but all 

 * Sec p. 231, !ind also p. lifiB of the present Number. Tlie specimen 

 mentioned by Mr. Thompson is now in the British Museum.— E. W. B. 



