* 536 
was accompanied with a meteor. 
of Mr. Howard, that the fimilavity of the 
component parts, efpecially of the mal- 
Jeable alley, together with the near ap- 
proach of the, conftituent proportions of 
the earths contained in each of the four 
ftones to which we have referred, wiil 
eftablith frong evidence in favour of the 
affertion, that they have fallen on our 
globe. They have been found at places 
very remote from each other, and at pe- 
yiods alfo fufficiently diftant. “The mine- 
ralogifts who have examined them, /agree 
that they have no refemblance to mineral 
fubfances, properly fo called; nor have 
they been defcribed by mineralogical au- 
thors. The public may, from our for- 
mer paper, determine for themfelves what 
degree of credit is to be paid to the ac- 
counts, of fallen ftones, and judge of the 
fimnilarity of circumftances attendant on 
fuch phenomena. Attempts to reconcile 
occurrences of this nature with known 
principles of philofophy are abundant, 
but they leave us a choice of difficulties 
equally perplexing. It is, however, te- 
markable, that. Dr. Chiadni,. in his eb- 
fervations on Fire-balls and hard bodies 
Falicn from the Atmofpkere, has connected 
the deicent of fallen ftones with meteors ; 
and the defcent of the ftones near Benares 
No ju- 
minous appearance was, however, per- 
ceived during the day on which the {tone 
fell in Yorkthire; but the ftones from 
Sienna fell amidft what was imagined 
lightning, but what might in reality have 
been a meteor. The ifiones that fell at 
Agen were alfo accompanied with a me- 
teor; and we are told that the ftone 
which was adored as the Mother of the 
Gods by the ancients, fell at the feet of 
the poet Pindar, envelloped in a ball of 
fire. 
Should it hereafter be difcovered that 
fallen ftones are aCtually the bodies of me- 
teors, it would nct appear fo problema- 
tical, that {uch mailes as thefe ftones are 
fometimes reprefented, do not penetrate 
further into the earth; forjmeteors. move 
more in a horizoutal than in a perpendi- 
cular direction: and we are as abfolutely 
unacquainted with the force which im- 
pels the meteor, as with the origin of the 
fallen fone. 
In the year 1801, a very brilliant me- 
teor was obferved in the county of Suf- 
folk, part of which was faid to fall near 
the town of Bury, and to confume a cot- 
tage; but, upon accurate enquiry, the 
On Stores, Sc. faid to have fallen from the Crouds. {Jan. 1, 
time of the combuftion of the houfe did 
not correfpond with the moment of the 
meteor’s tranfition. . . 
A phenomenon much more worthy of 
attention, has been defcribed as feen in 
America on the night) of the fifth of 
April, 1800. its apparent fize was that 
of a large. houfe feventy feet long ; and 
its elevation about 200 yards above the 
furface of the earth. It moved with pro- 
digious velocity, and the light produced 
effeéts little fhort of thofe of the fun- 
beams; and ‘a confiderable degree of heat 
was felt by thofe who faw it, without any 
electric fenfation. Immediately after ut 
difappeared in the north-weft, a violent 
rufhing noife was heard,, as if the pheno- 
mencon were bearing down the foreft. be- 
fore it, and, in a féw feconds afver, there 
was a tremendous crafhy caufing a very 
feniible earthquake. Search being after- 
wards made in the place where the burn- 
ing body fell, every vegetable was found 
burnt, or greatly fcorched, and a cenfi- 
derable portion of the furface of the earth 
broken up. It does not appear, however, 
that any pains were taken to fearch deeper 
than the furface of the ground. S 
We have alfo an account in the Philo- 
fophical Tranfactions for the year 1738, 
of a folitary mafs of what has been cailed 
native “iron, which was difcovered in 
South America, as has been deferibed by 
Don Rubin de Celis; who, mentious ano- 
ther infulated) mafs of the fame nature. 
M. Prouk and Mr. Howard have exa-'. 
mined fome fragments of this mafs, which 
they obtained: from the Britith Mufeum ; 
and it is their opinion, that it is not 
wholly iron, but a mixture of that metal 
with nickel. 
From this we are led to notice. the na- 
tive iron found near Mount Kemirs, in 
Siberia, and defcribed by Palias. This 
we are told, the Tartars confidered as a 
facred relic which had dropped from Hea-’ 
ven. The nicke! found in tie one mafs, 
and the traditionary hiftery of the other, 
without comparing the globular bodies of 
the ftone trom Benares with the globular 
concavities and the earthy matter of the 
Siberian iron, terd, in the opinion of Mr. 
Howard, to the formation of a chain be- 
tween fallen ftones and all kinds of native 
iron. 
The Count de Bournon informs us that 
all the kinds of iron, called native, con- 
tain nickel. The mafs-in South America 
is hollow, has concavities, and eal to 
Dave 
