202 BASALT. 



also referred the opaque flocculent wliite mineral. Minute amounts of iron were 

 found. The analysis and composition as given are not satisfactory, and it is thought 

 that a more extended microscopic examination would throw some light upon the 

 subject. This, like the Shergotty meteorite, is probably closely like the gabbros in 

 structure,* 



Biisii, India. 



According to Tschermak, this is composed of crystals and fragments lying in a fine- 

 grained, splintery groundmass, all composed of diopside, enstatite, plagioclase, nickel- 

 iferous iron, oldhamite, and osbornite. 



The diopside predominates, and has a gray to violet color, and contains rounded 

 and needle-shaped crystals arranged parallel to the fibrous cleavage. These inclusions 

 are the cause of the violet color. 



The enstatite is in colorless splinters, and in gray cloudy forms replete with inclusions. 

 These often show a polyhedral contour, and are filled with a pale-brownish glass, bear- 

 ing bubbles. The plagioclase occurs only sparingly, and is colorless and nearly free 

 from inclusions. The oldhamite only appears in a portion of the rock in rounded 

 grains having a cubic cleavage ; the osbornite in octahedrons in the nickel-iron, 

 which occurs only sparingly.! 



ShaUca, India. 



Tschermak describes this meteorite as composed of a clear-gray, somewhat friable 

 mass, with inclusions of larger, greenish-gray, bronzite grains, and blacl^ish chromites. 

 Under the microscope the larger bronzites are seen to lie in a groundmass of bronzite 

 fragments. This mineral often contains brown glass inclusions or opaque grains. 

 The last are arranged in the fissures in the bronzite, and are referred to pyrrhotite. 

 Some greenish-yellow grains, regarded by Eose as belonging to olivine, were placed 

 by Tschermak under bronzite, on account of their cleavage and action in acid. $ 



Ibhenhilhrcn, Westphalia. 



The meteorite of Ibbenbiihren consists of a grayish-white, granular mass, in which 

 large and small grains of a light-yellowish-green mineral are unequally distributed. 

 From the chemical analysis and physical character of this mineral. Von Eath referred 

 it to bronzite, and to the same mineral he assigned the groundmass, regarding the 

 entire meteorite as composed of bronzite (diallage). § 



According to Tschermak, || the bronzite forms the principal portion of the stone, 

 and occurs in irregular grains of varying size. Some thin lamiuiie M'ere referred to 

 augite, and some little colorless grains filling the interspaces between the bronzite 

 grains were looked upon as plagioclase, or possibly tridymite. The inclusions are in 

 part reddish-brown glass, and in part opaque grains referred to chromite and iron. 



Greenland. 



On account of its interest in connection with the occurrence of metallic iron in 

 basalts, a description of the iron-bearing basalt of Greenland is placed here in con- 

 nection with these basaltic meteorites. 



* Phil. Trans., 1870, pp. 211-213. f Die mikros. Besch. der Meteoriten, 1883, i. 9. 



X Die mikros. Besch. der Met.eoriten, 1883, i. 10. § Monats. Berlin. Akad., 1872, pp. 27-30. 

 II Die mikros. Besch. der Meteoviten, 1883, i. 10. 



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