122 Dr. Walter Flight — History of Meteorites. 



Specimen I. is distinguished from II. by a large proportion of com- 

 bined iron. By treatment with alcohol, calcium chloride was extracted 

 and determined in I. ; with cold distilled water, the soluble salts 

 were removed from II. and III. I. contains more lime sulphate and 

 less chloride than II. and III. 



These meteoric masses are distinguished by the amount of carbon, 

 free and combined, which they contain ; by the presence in them of 

 a large proportion of iron in combination with oxygen, but in what 

 state of oxidation is not clearly ascertained ; and by the occurrence 

 of soluble chlorides and sulphates, especially calcium sulphate, 

 throughout their structure. No salt of potassium has been detected 

 in them, nor, which is very remarkable, has sodium chloride been 

 found, although carefully sought for. The intimate distribution of 

 these salts through the Ovifak iron is certainly an indication that 

 they must be numbered among the original constituents of these 

 meteorites. 



Daubree noticed that specimen II. showed a marked tendency to 

 absorb water and to rust away ; a few days sufficed to make this 

 apparent. The local nature of the oxidation he attributes to the 

 irregular distribution of the deliquescent salts. Among these com- 

 pounds, instead of iron chloride, to the action of which the 

 decay of meteoric iron has usually been ascribed, calcium chloride 

 appears to play the most prominent part. In support of this view 

 it may be remarked that No. II. iron, the one most liable to change, 

 is that containing the greatest proportion of this salt, the amount being- 

 six times that met with in No. I. iron. 



Calcium and magnesium sulphates were noticed by Daubree to 

 form constituents of the Orgueil Stone, and the latter salt is also 

 present in the aerolites of Kaba and Alais. All these are carbon- 

 aceous meteorites. May the calcium sulphate of these irons, as well 

 as that of the above-mentioned aerolite, be a product of the oxidation 

 of a calcium (magnesium) sulphide such as occurs in the meteorite of 

 Busti, which stone also contains, among other constituents, augite 

 and metallic iron ? 



The greater stability which these masses exhibited so long as they 

 were in polar latitudes is no doubt due to the reduced tension- of 

 aqueous vapour ; had they fallen in regions further south and been 

 exposed to a milder climate, they would without doubt have long since 

 fallen to powder. 



In his second paper "Wohler points out the probability of the No. II. 

 iron which Daubree examined being of the same kind as that 

 which he himself analysed. He remarks that, although Daubree 

 found this variety of the metal to show a tendency to oxidize even 

 in a few days, his specimen had remained bright and unchanged 

 after it had been a year in his collection. 



Nauckhoff, whose exhaustive examination of the rocks associated 

 with the Ovifak irons we shall immediately turn to consider, analysed 

 the spangles and spherules which can be removed by a magnet from 

 the rock that occurs in rounded masses in the basalt ridge, and of 

 which the composition is given in the table of his analyses under III. 

 Some of these spangles could be pulverized only with difficulty, and 



