133 On the Convergcncy of the Solar Beams. 



present find room ; but we think it may be perhaps more ea^ 

 sily understood from the following illustration. 



Let us suppose a line to join the eye of the observer and 

 the sun; let rays issue from the sun in all possible directions, 

 and let us suppose that planes pass through these radiations, 

 and through the line joining the observer and the sun, which 

 will be their common intersection, like the axis of an orange, 

 or the axis of the earth, through which there passes all the septa 

 of the former and all the planes passing through the meridians 

 of the latter. An eye, therefore, situated in that line or com- 

 mon intersection of all the planes, will see them diverging from 

 the sun on one side, and converging towards the opposite point, 

 just as an eye in the axis of a globe would perceive all the 

 planes passing through the meridians, diverging on one side 

 and converging on another. 



Art. XXIV. — History of the Great Mass of Native Malle- 

 able Iron of Louisiana, now deposited in the Museum of 

 the New York Historical Society. 



Just as the last sheets of this Journal were about to be put 

 to press, we have been favoured, through the kindness of Mr. 

 Allan, with the last number of Professor Silliman's Journal, 

 which has arrived by a shorter channel than our own copy, 

 and which contains two articles of such deep scientific interest, 

 that we have been obliged to delay several other articles in 

 order to find room for them. The first of these relates to the 

 malleable iron of Loaisiana, and has been drawn up from 

 various original documents communicated to Professor Silli- 

 man. 



" In 1808, while Captain Glass was trading among the Pawnee and 

 Hietan nations;, he heard of a curious mineral, and saw the Pawnee In- 

 dian who discovered it on the territory of the Hietans. Captain Glass 

 and several of his party accompanied some Indians, and saw the mass 

 in situ. The Indians regarded it with much veneration, and ascribed to 

 it singular power in the cure of diseases. They informed him that they 

 knew of two other smaller pieces, the one about thirty, and the other 

 about fifty miles distant. 



This intelligence having excited much curiosity, two rival parties were 

 formed in 1810 for obtaining this metal, one at Natchitoches, consisting; 



