Abstract
II.
WE may next turn our attention to the nature of the substances which fall on these occasions, and in the first place it may be briefly stated that they are of three kinds: first, masses of iron, alloyed with nickel, termed aërosiderites, or briefly siderites; secondly, stony meteorites (aërolites), which consist of silicates somewhat analogous to terrestrial rocks, but having nickeliferous iron disseminated in small granules throughout them: and finally, there is a sort of meteorite which is intermediate between these iron and stone masses, consisting of a sponge-like mass of the iron, containing in its hollows stony matter similar to that of the aerolites. These are what are termed siderolites (or meso-siderites). These different kinds of meteorites—namely, siderites, siderolites, and aërolites—then, comprehend all the forms of matter, as at present known, which fall to the earth from the regions external to its atmosphere.
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MASKELYNE, N. Some Lecture Notes on Meteorites * . Nature 12, 504–507 (1875). https://doi.org/10.1038/012504a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/012504a0