14 



A South Australian Meteorite. 

 Plate I. 

 By G. a. Goyder, F.C.S. 



[Read April 2, 1601.] 



This siderite was brought to the School of Mines for de- 

 termination by Mr. H. W. Payne, of Rhine Villa, who states 

 that it was found on the surface partly covered with soil, 

 and that there were no other stones of a similar nature to 

 be seen about the surface except one or two little flakey pieces 

 which appeared to have fallen off the one sent. These pieces 

 were lost m digging to try and find more large pieces. He 

 also states that no one had seen a meteor fall m that locality. 

 The meteorite, when received, had been a good deal knocked 

 about with a hammer, and some of the prominences on it 

 thus flattened ; on the untouched surfaces it carries a thin 

 coating of oxide, but does not show any wavy lines of flow. 

 The photographic representation herewith of natural size 

 shows the general contour and thumb-like depressions. The 

 weight is 3,325 gms. (7^ lbs.) Specific gravity, 7.693. 



A piece was sawn off, ground, polished, and etched with 

 dilute nitric acid, which brought out the Widmanstatten 

 figures very prominently, as seen in the accompanying drawing. 

 Twinning lamellce (Neumann lines) could also be seen on parts 

 of the section, especially with a magnifying glass, but hardly 

 in the photograph representation. TEis siderite appears to 

 consist principally of karnacite, with thin plates of taenite be- 

 tween the karnacite blades, small veins and also grains of 

 troilite are sparsely scattered through the section and from the 

 quantity of phosphorus found by the analysis, schreibersite is 

 also probably present. 



Analysis by Mr. W. S. Chapman. 



Insoluble in aqua regia 



Iron . . . 



Nickel 



Cobalt 



Sulphur 



Phosphorus 



0.03 

 88.85 

 9.07 

 0.34 

 0.75 

 0.27 



99.31 



