The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1896-12-31
METEORIC SCIENCE.

An Important Recent Find in New
Mexico-New Catalogue of the Yale
University Collection-Th Meteor of
December A.
The next number of the American
Journal Of Science will give an account
by Warren M. Foote of Philadelphia of
the recent finding of a. meteorite which
fell in 1876 in the Sacramento Noun
tains Of New Mexico, and was seen at
it's fall by Mr.. M Bartlett of Florence,
Arizona. The meteorite passed through
the heavens in a southerly direction,
and fell with a report like a cannon.
The facts We're reported by Mr.. Bart
lett to Mr. c. r. Biederman, who began
an investigation, which was fruitless
until, by chance, a small sample of iron
found by a shepherd Of the region
proved to be meteoric, and led to the
locating of the mass, which had fallen
on the top of a limestone HILL where it
was partly buried Mr.. Biedeman and
his party with much labor dragged it
six miles over the desert to a wagon
road. No pieces We're found near it,
and it is complete except for two pieces,
weighing together about five pounds,
| which have been broken or sawed from
| the mass.
| The New York Evening Post says as
| follows: The new-found meteorite is a
| typical example of the class of slider
| ties, weighing about 521 pounds, and
about 80 inches long, "a inches broad,
and s inches thick It has the char
acteristic thumb marks, and on a
fiat side it has two cup-shaped pits
from four to six inches in diameter,
which are a. remarkable feature. Al
the point where the fragments were
removed the octahedral cleavage and
! lines of disqualification are noticeable to
g. degree rarely seen in iron. 1t Is,
| however, on the etched surface pre-
pared through treating a polished slab
with dilute nitric acid, in the usual
manner, that the beauty Of the crystal
| line structure is best seen. In this re-
| spect it ranks among the finest of re-
| corded irons, the Widmannstaetten
figures being exceptionally regular and
distinct. The broad bands of kama
cite are symmetrical, the prominence
| of the interlacing of shining White
threads of the niccoliferous iron bcirg
especially remarkable, and distinguish
! ing it from the FL Captain meteoric
| iron, found in 1893 about ninety miles
north of the Sacramento range. In the
latter iron the percentage of iron is
less and nickel greater, phosphorus also
| 70
! sis shows the following results, with q
very small remainder undetermined:
| Iron. 81 SO per cent.
Nickel. 1856 per cent.
Cobalt. Observation-Disclosures. 50 per cent.
| Total. ....................99 per cent.
| The mass is perfectly preserved, there
being no sign of disintegration or ext
| dalton of lawrencite. The saving
shows it to be quite soft and generally
homogeneous. The entire lack of sur
| face alteration proves that it fell at a
comparatively recent date, and leads to
| the conclusion that it is the meteor seen
| to fall by Mr.. Bartlett, whose account
led to the discovery.
! Dr.. H. S. Washington of Peabody
| Museum Yale university, has printed
a new catalogue of the collection of
meteorites in that institution, the last
catalogue having been published ten
years ago. The latter catalogue show
| ed that there were in the museum 147
| specimens of stones and irons, an in
| crease of As over the previous cata-
Iogue of 1869. At the present time (1S96)
the total number of falls represented is
| POI, an increase of 81 per cent. The to-
| tai weight of stones and irons is about
| S,025 pounds, an increase of SO per cent,
| there being about thirteen times the