Isxii REPORT — 18~G. 



vestigations of Lockycr on the absoiptivc powers of metallic and metalloidal 

 vapours at difForeut temperatures. From the vapour of calcium the latter 

 lias obtained two wholly difstinct spectrn, one belonging to a low, and the 

 other to a high temperature. Mr. Lockyer is also engaged on a new and 

 greatly extended map of the solar spectrum. 



Spectrum analysis has lately led to the discovery of a new metal — gallium 

 — the fifth whose presence has been first indicated bj'' that powerful agent. 

 This discovery is duo to M. Lccoq dc Boisbaudran, already favourably known 

 by a work on the application of the spectroscope to chemical analysis. 



Oiu- knowledge of aerolites has of late years been greatly increased ; and I 

 cannot occupy a few moments of your time more usefully than by briefly 

 referring to the subject. So recently as 1 860 the most remarkable meteoric 

 fall on record, not even excepting that of L'Aigle, occurred near the village of 

 New Concord in Ohio. On a day when no thunder-clouds were visible, loud 

 sounds were heard resembling claps of thunder, followed by a large fall of 

 meteoric stones, some of which were distinctly seen to strike the earth. One 

 stone, above 50 pounds in weight, buried itself to the depth of two feet in 

 the ground, and when dug out was found to be still warm. In 1872 another 

 remarkable meteorite, at first seen as a brilliant star with a luminous train, 

 burst near Orvinio in Itah', and six fragments of it were afterwards collected. 



Isolated masses of metallic iron, or rather of an alloy of iron and nickel, 

 similar in composition and properties to the iron usually diffused in 

 meteoric stones, have been found here and there on the surface of the 

 earth, some of large size, as one described by Pallas, which weighed about 

 two thirds of a ton. Of the meteoric origin of these masses of iron there 

 is little room for doubt, although no record exists of their fall. Sir Edward 

 Sabine, whose life has been devoted with rare fidelity to the pursuit of 

 science, and to whose imtiring efforts this Association largelj' owes the 

 position it now occupies, was the pioneer of the newer discoveries in meteoric 

 science. Eight and fifty years ago he visited with Captain Eoss the northern 

 shores of Baffin's Bay, and made the interesting discovery that the knife- 

 blades used by the Es{}uimaux in the vicinity of the Arctic highlands were 

 formed of meteoric iron. This observation was afterwards fully confirmed ; 

 and scattered blocks of meteoric iron have been found from time to time 

 around BnfHu's Bay. But it was not till 1870 that the meteoric treasures 

 of Baffin's Bay were truly discovered. In that year Nordenskiold found, at 

 a part of tlie shore difficult of oppruach even in moderate weather, enor- 

 mous blocks of meteoric iron, the Inrgest weighing nearly twenty tons, im- 

 bedded in a ridge of basoliie rock. The interest of this observation is greatly 

 enhanced by the circumstance that these masses of meteoric iron, like tha 

 basalt with which they are associated, do net belong to the present geologi- 

 cal epoch, l)ut must have fallen long before the actual arrangement of land 

 and sea existed,— during, in short, the middle Tertiary, or Miocene period of 



