April 14, 1887] 



NA TURE 



573 



and harm us. Looking up to the sky we saw from time to time 

 exhalations or stars, which soon went out, but without noise. 

 We returned after a Httle and found in the hole a hot stone, 

 which we could barely handle, which on the next day we saw 

 looked like a piece of iron ; all night it rained stars, but we saw 

 none fall to the ground as they seemed to be extinguished while 

 still very high up. ' 



"The above is the simple recital of the ranchman, and the 

 uranolite which fell is the one I send to you. From the 

 numerous questions I have asked Sr. Mijares, I am convinced 

 that there was no explosion or breaking up on falling. Others 

 who saw the phosphorescence, &c. , were Luz Sifuentes, Pascual 

 Saeuz, Miguel Martinez, Justo Lopez, and some whose names I 

 have not obtained. Upon visiting the place of the fall I was 

 particular to examine the earth in and around the hole, and by 

 careful search and washing the earth I found a few small bits of 

 iron, which must have become detached from the uranolite when 

 it penetrated the earth. 



" The hole was 30 centimetres deep. Probably the light 

 which was seen came from the volatilisation of the surface of 

 the celestial body due to the high temperature acquired by 

 friction with the atmosphere, and of this volatilised matter falling 

 to the earth as an incandescent powder." 



The above communication was followed by an account 

 of the observation of the Biela meteors at Zacatecas by Prof. 

 Bonilla and his assistants. (See Annals N.Y. Acad. Sci. 

 1887.) 



The locality of the fall is situated in latitude 24" 35' N. 

 and in longitude 101° 56' 45" West of Greenwich. 



That no explosion was heard when this iron fell, is paralleled 

 by the account of the fall of the fifty-six pound aerolite near 

 Wold Cottage, Yorkshire, England, on December 13, 1795. 

 "This stone fell within 10 yards of where a labourer was at 

 work. No thunder, lightning, or luminous meteor accompanied 

 the fall ; but in two of the adjacent villages the sounds were so 

 distinct of something passing through the air towards JWold 



Cottage that several people went to see if anything extraordinary 

 had happened to the house or the grounds" (L. Fletcher, " An 

 Introduction to the Study of Meteorites," 1886, p. 22). Con- 

 cerning the aerolites which fell at 1 1.50 a m., on June 28, 1876, 

 at Stalldalen, in Sweden, "it is remarkable that no meteor was 

 visible at the place where the stones fell, though it was seen over 

 nearly all Sweden." 



The surface of the Mazapil iron is of great interest. The 

 deeply hollowed depressions entirely cover the mass (see Fig. i). 

 A thin black crust coats the surface, and exhibits well the strire 

 of flow, as seen on meteorites whose fall has been observed. In 

 eleven places nodules of graphite are noticed extruding from the 

 surface (the engraving shows some of these), one of them is 

 nearly an inch in diameter. The graphite is very hard and 

 apparently amorphous ; troilite and schreibersite were noticed 

 on a section cut off for analysis and for the development of the 

 figures of Widmanstiitten. The crystalline structure (see Fig. 2) 

 is well shown in the engraving (Ives' process) which is of natural 

 size. The lines are somewhat similar to that of the Rowton 

 iron in their width and distribution, and are very unlike the 

 known Mexican irons from Toluca, &c. 



In its surface and general flatness the mass bears a remarkable 



resemblance to the Hraschina, Agram, iron' which-fell May 26, 

 1751. In its weight it is nearly like the irons of Rowton 



Fig. 2.— Section of Mazapil Meteoric Iron (natural size. 

 (73 lbs.), Charlotte (gj lbs.), Victoria West (6 lbs. 6 ozs.), and 

 NedagoUa (9 J lbs.), which were all seen to fall. 



* See ** Bcitrage zur Geschichte und Kenntniss meteorischer Stein-und 

 Metalmasscn," by Dr. Carl von Schreibers, Wien, 1820, plate viii. 



