On Bacitbirito. — JJ'ard. 205 
22^2 times as much as our own. What may have caused this 
so vastly greater mass of Mexican meteorites we will not 
venture to define. Has the great hight above sea-level of the 
^Mexican plateau, with its drier air and drier soil, delayed the 
decomposition and wasting away of their irons ? But Anighito 
m Greenland, Bendego in Brazil and Cranbonrne in southern 
Australia, three giants, all lay close at sea-level, and all three 
were in exceptionally moist regions. 
The Mexican government has taken an active and enlight- 
ened part in the protection of her meteorites. Twelve years 
ago it expended the sum of $10,000 in bringing five of the larg- 
est to the capital, where they are mounted on huge iron 
pillars in the entrance coiu't of the School of ]Mnies. 
Having- during the last fifteen years paid visits to most of 
these ]\Iexican meteorite localities, seeing most of the large 
masses before the}' had been removed from the spot where 
thev fell, and where some of them had lain perhaps for many 
centuries, the writer acquired great interest in all that per- 
tained to them. \Miile in the capital a few^ months ago. study- 
ing and cutting some of the large pieces in the ^luseo 
Nacional, the writer fought almost in vain ir scientific circles 
for substantiation and defining of stories which have long 
been current relating to an enormous iron meteorite existing 
in the state of Sinaloa. far in the north-west portion of the 
Reptiblic. 
The first and. so far as I can find, the only positive notice 
of this meteorite was in 1876. Then Senor ^Nlariano Barcena,. 
a noted [Mexican scientist and astronomer, in a page article 
in the Proceedings of the Philadelphia Acad'^.my of Sciences 
devoted to [Mexican meteorites, notices "an enormous mete- 
oric mass lately discovered in the state of Sinaloa." 
- He says, 'T can assure the Academy that its length was 
more than twelve feet."' Many years later Castillo in his cat- 
alogue of [Mexican meteorites refers to this same mass, giving 
its length at 3.65 metres; with 2 metres in hight and 1.5a 
metres thick. Three years later. Eastman, of the United States 
Naval Observatory, taking the above measures as being cor- 
rect, estimated its weight as 40,800 kilograms, or about 42 
tons. Brezina, Cohen and Wulfing speak of it as weighing 
50 tons, and as being the largest meteorite in the world. But 
