216 Dr. Walter Flight — History of Meteorites. 



angle in the contour of the crystals, and the fineness of the striae, 

 peculiar to bronzite. When magnified 800 diameters, most of the 

 crystals are found to enclose yellowish-brown rarely translucent mat- 

 ter, with very varied contour, and occasionally with a crystalline form, 

 that of a modified oblique prism, which is that of pyroxene. They 

 are ranged in rectilinear series, which are not always orientated 

 parallel to the axes of the crystal. Here and there, adhering to the 

 crystals, a brown vitreous substance, which is without action on 

 polarized light, is seen ; and in it occur cavities of relatively large 

 dimensions, closely resembling those usually found in basaltic rocks. 

 The Koda meteorite, with the single exception that it contains no 

 iron, bears a great likeness to the meteorite of Lodran (1868, October 

 1st), and establishes a new link between cosmical rocks and those 

 belonging to our planet. If, says Daubree, we were to refuse to 

 admit the testimony of those persons who affirm that they witnessed 

 the fall of this fragment of rock, the characters of its crust would 

 fully attest its cosmical origin. 



1871. November. Montereau, Seine-et-Efarne, France. 1 

 " It is stated that a meteorite, weighing 1271bs., lately fell near 

 Montereau. It came from the east, and burst with a loud explosion, 

 emitting a bright blue light. It is an irregular spheroid, and is 

 black (on the outer surface only ?). It is to be sent to the Academy 

 of Sciences." No more recent information respecting this meteorite 

 has reached me. 



1871. December 10th. 130 p.m. Goemorceh, etc., near Bandong, 



Java. 2 



Three strange explosions were heard, and six stones were found. 

 The largest, weighing 8 kilog., fell in a rice-field in the village of 

 Goemorceh, and penetrated the soil obliquely to* the depth of one 

 metre. The second, 2-24 kilog. in weight, and a third, weigh- 

 ing 0-68 kilog., fell in a rice-field about 2200 metres S.W. 

 of Babakan Djattie, and 1500 metres from Tjignelling, or 3700 

 metres from the spot where the first stone struck the ground. The 

 three remaining stones weighed in all 150 grammes. 



The stone the second in size, now in the Paris collection, is 

 an irregular block, with rounded edges. It is completely enveloped 

 in a dull black crust, and the natural surface exhibits numerous 

 cavities of different size, which bear a great resemblance to those 

 produced on quartzite by exposing it to the oxy-hydrogen flame. 3 

 A fresh fracture is grey, and inclosed in the silicate forming the 

 greater portion of the stones are three kinds of granules, which have 

 metallic lustre : the one, of an iron grey, which is at once identified 

 as nickel-iron ; a second, of a bronze-yellow, which often possesses a 

 blue or yellow tint, is troilite ; and a third, black and insoluble, is 

 chromite. The siliceous portion, when examined under the microscope, 



1 Nature, November 30, 1871. — R. P. Greg. Brit. Assoc. Report, 1872, 79. 



2 G. A. Daubree and R. Everwijn. Compt. rend., lxxv. 1676. 



3 Annates dcs Mines, xix. (1869), 29. 



