OF INFINITE SPACE. 71 



together with the eras of their descent, and the persons on 

 whose evidence the facts rest ; but the list might be greatly 

 extended. 



The following are the principal facts with reference to 

 these substances, upon which general dependence may be 

 placed. Immediately after the descent of the stones or other 

 bodies, they are intensely hot. They are covered with a 

 fused black incrustation consisting chiefly of oxide of iron ; 

 and what is most remarkable, their chemical analysis de- 

 velops the same substances in nearly the same proportions, 

 though one may have reached the earth in India and an- 

 other in England. Their specific gravities are about the 

 same; considering 1000 as the proportionate number for 

 the specific gravity of water, that of some of the stones has 

 been found to be 



Ennesheim stone - 3233 



Benares - - - 3352 

 Sienna - 3418 



Yorkshire - - 3508 

 Bachalay's - - 3535 

 Bohemia - - - 4281 



Gassendi's - - - 345G 



The greater specific gravity of the Bohemian stone arose 

 from its containing a larger proportion of iron. An an- 

 alysis of one of the stones that fell at L'Aigle gives 



Silica - - 46 per cent 

 Magnesia - 10 

 Iron 45 



Nickel - -- - - 2 

 Sulphur ... 5 

 Zinc .... 1 



Iron is found in all these bodies, and in a considerable 

 quantity, with the rare metal nickel. It is a singular fact, 

 that though a chemical examination of their composition 

 has not discovered any substance with which we were not 

 previously acquainted, yet no other bodies have yet been 

 found, native to the earth, which contain the same ingre- 

 dients combined. Neither products of the volcanoes, whether 

 extinct or in action, nor the stratified or unstratified rocks, 

 have exhibited a sample of that combination of metallic 

 and earthy substances which the meteoric stones present 

 During the era that science has admitted their path to the 



