David Forbes — On Meteorites. 223 



sucli meteors which, from their having at various times fallen down 

 from the atmosphere on to our earth, have afforded us the means of 

 examining their physical and chemical nature, and to which the 

 names of Meteorites or Aerolites, i.e. meteoric or atmospheric stones, 

 have been specially applied. That such bodies in their descent 

 present the appearance of balls of fire or luminous meteors is well 

 known ; but as yet we are not certain that all luminous or igneous 

 meteors are true meteorites in this sense, notwithstanding that recent 

 researches indicate that falling stars, meteors, meteorites, and even 

 comets, are all bodies differing only in size, but otherwise similar, if 

 not identical, in composition. The descent of falling stars, fiery 

 globes or thunderbolts, as they are commonly called from the attend- 

 ant noise, has, without doubt, often attracted man's attention even in 

 the most ancient or prehistoric times ; for we find amongst the tradi- 

 tions of all nations, descriptions of glowing meteors rushing down from 

 the heavens, to the dire consternation of the inhabitants of the earth, 

 who long imagined them to be harbingers of war, pestilence, famine, 

 or other dreadful calamities in store for them, and retained the belief 

 that some such catastrophe would end in the entire destruction of 

 our globe by shattering it in pieces in the collision, or burning it up 

 in a grand conflagration. 



Amongst the Arabs, the year 902 is still called the Year of the 

 Stars, because of the large number of falling stars which were 

 observed on the night in October on which the Caliph Ibraham-ben- 

 Ahmed died, and as recently as Feb. 9, 1865, when a large meteor 

 was seen at Salem, in the Carnatic, the Hindoos declared that a king 

 was about to die, their belief in this idea being no doubt greatly 

 strengthened by it so happening that the Eajah of Mysore did then die. 



It is but natural to anticipate that the fall of any heavy body 

 from the clear heavens above us, could not take place without making 

 a deep and lasting impression on those who witnessed its descent, so 

 that it is easy to understand how, in the early ages, aerolites came 

 to be regarded with extreme veneration. Herodian informs us that 

 at Emesa, in Syria, a large black conical meteoric stone was, from 

 its having fallen from the clouds, worshipped as the representative 

 of the sun, and that this stone was afterwards brought with great 

 pomp to Kome by Elagabalus, the high priest of its temple. In the 

 Parian chronicle, also, it is recorded, that the mother of the gods 

 was adored at Pessinus, in Galatia, imder the form of a stone which 

 had fallen from heaven, and which was regarded with such rever- 

 ence that a treaty was made by the Eomans with Attalus, King of 

 Pergamus, for its acquisition, in virtue of which it was solemnly 

 brought to Rome, and placed in the temple of Cybele by Publius 

 Scipio Nasica, about 204 years before the Christian era. In other 

 parts of the world we find, in like manner, that the celebi'ated Pallas 

 meteorite was for a long time revered by the Tartars of Siberia as a 

 heavenly relic ; and more recently the African travellei-, Dr. Earth, 

 found that the natives of Turuma, in Eastern Africa, worshipped a 

 stone which had fallen from the sky with the accompaniment of 

 thunder, over which they had built a rude temple, in which they 



