Four strips of magnesium ribbon in a bag. Magnesium is an extremely common alkaline earth metal. It is very reactive, and burns easily upon heating in air. It could be used in a range of different experiments.

This magnesium ribbon comes from a 15-drawer cabinet found in the Herschel family home in the 1950s. Collectively the contents of this and a similar cabinet seem to suggest that they were used by successive generations of the family to store specimens, material and apparatus for carrying out experiments. This magnesium ribbon was presumably used by John F.W. Herschel or his children (it may even have been used by John FW with his children) as the raw materials for experiments.