408 Proceedings of the Royal Physical Society. 



gether to disbelieve. We have also instances of the fall of 

 aerolites recorded in our own day, being followed by similar 

 results, as in a case noticed by the Rev. Baden Powell, M.A., 

 &c, in his Report on Meteors to the British Association in 

 1859 ; of a stone-fall at Dooralla, near Loodianah, in 1815, 

 when the natives worshipped it, and commenced subscriptions 

 for erecting a temple over it. Two stones fell at Parnallee, 

 near Madras, in 1857; and their fall was followed by exactly 

 the same results — crowds of natives worshipping the larger 

 stone, " as the image of their deity, which had fallen from 

 heaven" (see Silliman's American Journal of Science, No. 32, 

 Nov. 1861). One of these stones weighs 130 lbs., and is the 

 largest meteoric stone known ; it is now, I am glad to say, 

 deposited in the British Museum. 



There seems little doubt that meteoric falls were one, at least, 

 of the causes of the stone-worship of the ancients, instances 

 of which are represented on their coins, under canopies or 

 shrines. The Diana of Ephesus is not represented in this 

 way, although on an ancient medallion given as an illustration 

 to a learned paper on the Coins of Ephesus,* by Mr J. Y. Aker- 

 man, and struck, he supposes, for those who came to wonder 

 and to worship at her shrine, there is a rude mummy-like 

 figure of the goddess, and on its head, if not simply an im- 

 perfect modius, with which she is often represented, something 

 which reminds one of the very distinctive shape of a mete- 

 oric stone or aerolite. 



Mr Akerman, in a paper on the Stone- Worship of the An- 

 cients, illustrated by their Coins (Numismatic Journal, vol. ii. 

 1837-8), since pointed out to me by Mr G. Sim, also refers to 

 the probability of aerolites being objects of worship. 



Map of Meteoric Stone and Iron Falls. — The illustration 

 of the subject of aerolites would be increased if, in addition 

 to these published catalogues, we had also a map showing 

 their fall over all the world. I would be especially anxious, 

 in a map of this kind, that a careful distinction be made (by 

 colour or otherwise) between metallic, and earthy or stone 

 falls ; a distinction which, it appears to me, has scarcely been 

 kept sufficiently in view by some writers, when considering 

 * Numismatic Chronicle, vol iv. 1841, p. 118. 



