of native iron, took the opportunity of stating that they had been first discovered last year by the Swedish arctic expedition, which brought back several blocks of considerable size, which had been found on the coast of Greenland. The expedition of this year, however, has just succeeded in bringing back more than twenty additional specimens, amongst which two were of enormous size. The largest, weighing more than 49,000 Swedish pounds, or about 21 tons English, with a maximum sectional area of about 42 square feet, is now placed in the hall of the Royal Academy of Stockholm; whilst, as a compliment to Denmark, on whose territory they were found, the second largest, weighing 20,000 lbs., or about 9 tons, has been presented to the Museum of Copenhagen.
Several of these specimens have been submitted to chemical analysis, which proved them to contain nearly 5 per cent. of nickel, with from 1 to 2 per cent. of carbon, and to be quite identical, in chemical composition, with many aërolites of known meteoric origin. When polished and etched by acids, the surface of these masses of metallic iron shows the peculiar figures or markings usually considered characteristic of native iron of meteoric origin.
The masses themselves were discovered lying loose on the shore, but immediately resting upon basaltic rocks (probably of Miocene age), in which they appeared to have originally been imbedded; and not only have fragments of similar iron been met with in the basalt, but the basalt itself, upon being examined, is found to contain minute particles of metallic iron, identical in chemical composition with that of the large masses themselves, whilst some of the masses of native iron are observed to enclose fragments of the basalt.
As the chemical composition and mineralogical character of these masses of native iron are quite different from those of any iron of terrestrial origin, and altogether identical with those of undoubted meteoric iron. Professor Nordenskjöld regards them as aërolites, and accounts for their occurrence in the basalt by supposing that they proceeded from a shower of meteorites which had fallen down and buried themselves in the molten basalt during an eruption in the Miocene period. Notwithstanding that these masses of metallic iron were found lying on the shore between the ebb and flow of tide, it has been found, upon their removal to Stockholm, that they perish with extraordinary rapidity, breaking up rapidly and falling to a fine powder. Attempts to preserve them by covering them with a coating of varnish have as yet proved unsuccessful; and it is actually proposed to preserve them from destruction by keeping them in a tank of alcohol.
Mr. Maskelyne stated that the British Museum already possessed a specimen of this native iron, and accounted for its rapid destruction on exposure by the absorption of chlorine from terrestrial sources, which brought about the formation of ferrous chloride. This was particularly marked in the case of the great Melbourne meteorite in the British Museum. He had succeeded in protecting this, as well as the Greenland specimen, by coating them externally,
