Our Astronomical Coloumn

Abstract

THE PARIS ACADEMY.—At the annual public sitting of the Academy of Sciences at Paris, last week, the medal on the foundation of Lalande was awarded to M. Stanislas Meunier for his researches on the constitution of meteorites, which, in the opinion of the Commission appointed for the consideration of claims, have led to results that occasion surprise, but at the same time appear justified by M. Meunier's investigations. Astronomers had followed with interest the labours of M. Daubrée, who has contributed so much to establish a connection, little expected, between these bodies falling from the heavens, and the lower strata of our globe, and this circumstance has caused an increased amount of attention to die researches, of his pupil and follower, M. Meunier, who finds by his recent work that the analogy alluded to is not confined alone to milieralogical consti-tution, but that it is extended to the relation which these cosmical materials, disseminated in space, present when compared amongst themselves, as is done for the constituent rocks of our globe, The Commission considered that M, Meunier had reason to conclude, from his experiences, that all these masses once belonged to a considerable globe, like the earth, of true geological epochs, and that later it was decomposed into separate fragments, under the action of causes difficult to define exactly, but which ye have more than once seen in operation in the heaven itself. Such a conclusion, it is remarked, adds greatly to the interest attaching to these “minute stars:” the astronomer, once occupied only With their motions and their probable distribution in space, finds himself confronted with a sidereal geology, as he already was under the necessity, of having regard to celestial physics, celestial chemistry, and celestial mineralogy. The medal is awarded with the view to encourage M. Meunrer to follow up his studies, so interesting in regard to the constitution of the solar system.