METEORITES OF NORTH AMERICA. 365 



The large mass was purchased by the British Museum. 



Brezina, 4 under the name of Rancho de la Pila 1804, grouped the meteorite among the 

 Caille division of the medium octahedrites and described it as follows : 



It is free from troilite, the specks of kamacite are quite fine, and the bands 0.8 mm. wide. The more definite 

 indication of the locality of discovery is taken from a newly discovered piece procured from the British Museum. 

 Like the older ones, it shows distinctly the weathering out of octahedral skeletons. 



Fletcher * connected with the Rancho de la Pila mass one mentioned by Partsch * in 1843, 

 obtained from Karawinsky. His reasons for combining these are given as follows: 



A fragment of meteoric iron was acquired in 1834 from Freiherr von Karawinsky for the Vienna collection; he 

 had brought it with him from Mexico, and according to his statement to Partsch, it had been severed from a mass 

 which weighed several hundred pounds and lay in the plain northeast of Durango. There is no statement that Kara- 

 winsky had himself seen the original mass; nor does he mention the distance from Durango city. 



We have already seen that Weidner, when discussing the Mercado, remarked in 1858 that the fragments given to 

 Humboldt as Durango iron might very well have been brought from Durango and at the same time have been either 

 got from the "Labor de Guadalupe, an estate near Durango city," or from one of the two big masses which were lying 

 at "Conception and Rio Florida." . 



We infer that in 1858 it was regarded by Weidner as a recognized fact that metallic iron, not comparable in size 

 with the Chihuahua masses, had been really found at the Labor de Guadalupe; a search for a definite statement of 

 the discovery of metallic iron on that estate has been unsuccessful. 



But I am informed by Dr. Carlos Santa Maria, of Durango, that the above extensive estate begins at 5 leagues 

 northeast of the city; and this is the very direction which was assigned by Karawinsky for the locality of the mass of 

 which he sent fragments to Vienna in 1834; hence it is extremely probable that the Karawinsky mass is the one which 

 Weidner had in mind, when in 1858 he referred to the iron of the Labor de Guadalupe. No other record of the dis- 

 covery of a Durango mass on the eastern side of the city before 1858 can be found. 



A mass weighing 46.4 kgs. was turned up by a plow in 1882 at the rancho of La Pila, 9 leagues east of Durango. 

 Dr. Carlos Santa Maria sends me the information that the rancho is part of the estate called La Labor de Guadalupe, 

 which begins 5 leagues northeast of Durango and extends as far as La Pila, close to the hacienda of La Punta shown in 

 Garcia Cubas' map as 10 leagues southeast of Durango. * * * 



The specimen is now in the British Museum collection. 



Confirmation of the above suggestion as to the site of the Karawinsky mass is found in the statement of Brezina, 

 that the etching figures of the mass were identical with those of the one plowed up at La Pila. 



Mourner"* grouped the meteorite as Caillite, giving it the name of Rancho de la Pila, 1804. 

 He described it as follows : 



The specimens in the Paris museum from this fall are labeled, some Durango, others Cacaria, but they are identical 

 in every respect. They come from a locality called Rancho de la Pila. Etching gives an entirely normal figure, in 

 which the kamacite forms elongated bands, slightly bent. The tsenite occurs in very slender filaments and the pies- 

 site includes well marked ridges. 



Brezina, 7 in 1895, remarked further concerning the meteorite as follows : 



Pila has the greatest similarity with Descubridora and should in fact be identified with the latter except for the 

 fact that the localities are separated by 4 degrees of longitude. To Pila belong the pieces which were procured for 

 the Vienna Museum in 1834 by Karawinsky and which, according to Fletcher, came from the small estate of Labor de 

 Guadalupe, which begins 5 leagues northeast of the state of Durango. This same one was known already in 1804, 

 when Humboldt visited the country. Here also belongs a mass of 46.4 kgs. weight which was plowed up on the 

 Rancho de la Pila in 1882 and came into the possession of the British Museum. This iron agrees perfectly with the 

 old Durango iron, the fields in both being entirely filled with spotted combs. Both the old and the new Durango 

 iron show very markedly the weathering out of the octahedral laminae. To Pila also doubtless belongs the piece indi- 

 cated as Toluca which was brought by Humboldt to Bergmann, at Berlin. 



The meteorite is chiefly (46,512 grams) preserved in the British Museum. 



BIBLIOGRAPHY. 



1. 1843: PARTSCH. Meteoriten, pp. 113-114 (Karawinsky's Mass). 



2. 1856: BURKART. Fundorte I. Neues Jahrb. Min., 1856, pp. 282-283 (Karawinsky'a Mass). 



3. 1884: HAPKE. Beitrage. Abh. naturw. Verein Bremen Bd. 8, pp. 513-515 and 517. (Analysis by Janke.) 



4. 1885: BREZINA. Wiener Sammlung, pp. 155, 213, and 234. 



5. 1890: FLETCHER. Mexican Meteorites. Mineral. Mag., vol. 9, pp. 104, 152-154, and 156. 



6. 1893: MEUNIER. Revision des fers metdoriques, pp. 52 and 53. 



7. 1895: BREZINA. Wiener Sammlung, p. 276. 



