BISHOPVILLE METEORIC STONE: 



CHLADNITE PROVED TO BE A MAGNESIAS PYROXENE. 



In 1846 Professor C. TJ. Shepard published an account of an 

 exceedingly interesting meteoric stone that fell at Bishopville, 

 S. C, in 1843, differing in its external character from other 

 meteoric stones; the fractured mass being exceedingly white, 

 except where metallic iron and other associate minerals occur. 

 I would refer the reader to Prof. Shepard's description of it in 

 the American Journal of Science and Arts, September, 1846, 

 page 381. 



The composition of the snow-white mineral (constituting 

 about ninety per cent, of the entire mass), as given by Prof. 



Shepard, is Oxygen. Oxy. ratio. 



Silica 70.41 35.205 3 



Magnesia 28.25 11.300 1 



Soda 1.39 .338 



From the results of this analysis he considered it a tersilidate 

 of magnesia, constituting a new species, to which he gave the 

 name of chladnite. 



Several years after this examination a fragment of this 

 meteoric stone came into my possession, and separating a small 

 portion of the mineral in question it was examined. The result 

 of this incomplete examination justified the statement in a note 

 to a memoir of mine on meteorites, presented to the American 

 Scientific Association in April, 1854, and published in the Amer. 

 Jour, of Science and Arts for March, 1855, page 162, "that 

 from some investigations just made chladnite is likely to prove 

 a pyroxene." 



Since that announcement I have been placed in possession 

 of other fragments of the meteorite, and have been able to 

 separate the "chladnite" perfectly pure, and in sufficient quan- 

 tity to submit it to a thorough analysis. 



To render the chladnite soluble in acid it was fused with 

 four times its weight of carbonate of soda and potash, with a 



