“The aerolite was left at Tucson, where it continued to attract the attention of the scientific men who visited that country for more than a hundred years. Since the acquisition of Arizona by the United States, greater notice has been taken of this aerolite, it having been mentioned several times in the official reports of the Government agents.
“By a singular coincidence, Augustin Ainsa, the great-grandson of Don Juan Bautista Anza, undertook, in 1860, to transport the aerolite and present it to the Smithsonian Institution. With great difficulty it was brought as far as the Yñigo hacienda, where it remained until May, 1863, when Jesus M. Ainsa, in his late visit to Sonora, brought it to this city, with the intention of forwarding it to the Smithsonian Institution at Washington, where it will soon be sent.”
At present the mass in question lies upon the steps of the Custom House, where it has been most admirably photographed by Mr. Watkins.[2]
It was said by Mr. Ainsa to weigh 1,600 pounds.
The shape of this meteoric mass is very peculiar; and, at first, it would hardly be recognized as the identical specimen figured by Mr. Bartlett at Tucson, especially as this gentleman estimated its weight at 600 pounds only. Instead of being, as Mr. Bartlett supposed, a mass supported on two legs, it is, in reality, a ring of metal, of very irregular dimensions, of which about one-quarter was buried in the ground, in order to support it in a convenient position for use as an anvil, when it was seen by him at Tucson.
The dimensions of this ring are as follows:
| Greatest exterior diameter | 49 | inches. |
| Least exterior diameter | 38 | ” |
| Greatest width of central opening | 26½ | ” |
| Least width of central opening | 23 | ” |
| Greatest thickness at right angles to plane of ring | 10 | ” |
| Width of thickest part of the ring | 17½ | ” |
| Width of narrowest part | 2¾ | ” |
The weight of the mass corresponds, taking the specific gravity at 7.2, with a circle-ring, having an average width of one foot, and a thickness of a small fraction less than eight inches—the diameter of the circle represented by the exterior of the ring being assumed as four feet.
On examining with a magnifying glass a fractured surface of the mass, it was seen at once to be different in composition from the Carleton Meteoric Iron, and my conjecture that Prof. Smith was mistaken in supposing that he analyzed a fragment from the mass figured by Mr. Bartlett, was confirmed.[3] It is now almost certain that Messrs. Brush and Smith did analyze fragments of the same meteoric iron.