344 



Dr. W. Flight. On Meteorites, 



[Feb. 9,. 



the block belonging to Mr. Bruce came to be uncovered and moved it 

 was found to weigh 3J tons. Some difficulties arose respecting its 

 shipment to England, and eventually Mr. Abel's block was purchased 

 for 3007. by the Trustees of the British Museum, and presented to the 

 colony, and the larger mass was sent to this country. They lay 

 3'6 miles apart ; and the major axis of the Bruce meteorite, some 

 -5 English feet, lay exactly in the magnetic meridian of the place. 



The Bruce meteorite consists entirely of metallic minerals, and 

 contains no rocky matter whatever. The iron contains no combined 

 carbon, but from 7 to 9 per cent, of nickel, some cobalt, a little 

 silicium, and copper; and, distributed through its mass, rather less 

 than 1 per cent, of bright, apparently square prisms of a phosphide. 



Lying on the plates of meteoric iron, which make up the mass, were 

 found thin metallic plates of the thickness of writing paper, of a 

 ■flexible mineral, which had the composition Ee^io. It is this 

 mineral which forms the figures on etched surfaces, and not schrei- 

 berite as generally stated. I propose to call this compound Edmond- 

 sonite, in memory of the late George Edmondson, the Head Master of 

 Queenwood College, a great lover of science ; a man with whom ] 

 had the honour to be long and intimately connected. 



Nodules of troilite, varying from half an inch to two inches in. 

 length, are frequently met with. The composition of the sulphide 

 proved it to be the iron monosulphide beyond question. Occasionally 

 nodules of graphite were noticed, enclosing troilite in curious pointed 

 forms, so that a section resembles the outline of a holly leaf. The prisms 

 already referred to appear to be identical with the mineral to which 

 Gustav Kose gave the name of rhabdite, and to have the composition 

 indicated by the formula (Fe 4 Xi 3 )P. The resemblance between them 

 and the phosphide described by Sidot, and more recently by Mallard, 

 is gone into. A very brittle coarse powder, left by treating the iron 

 with acid, yielded what appears to be schreibersite with the formula 

 (Fe 3 Ni) 7 P. Among the debris of the meteorite were occasionally 

 found large brass-coloured oblique crystals; these readily cleave 

 across the base, and have a composition according with the formula 

 (FegXyPo. There were also curious crystals met with on two or three 

 occasions, apparently square prisms, which, while the sides were quite 

 bright and metallic, had a square centre of a dull, almost black, 

 colour ; this also is a phosphide, and has a composition closely accord- 

 ing with the formula (Fe T jS~i.->)P. 



Graphite occurs occasionally, but rarely, as nodules, sometimes as 

 nodules enclosing troilite, in one case in a mass extending over an 

 area 4 inches in length by 2 inches wide. It contained from 0*25 to 

 0"30 per cent, of hydrogen. 



The occluded gases amounted in bulk to 3*59 times the volume cf 

 the iron, and consisted of — 



