Thunder and Lightning

by Camille Flammarion

All the inhabitants, aroused in terror; instinctively several of them sprang out of bed, thinking that their dwellings must be annihilated. Every one had the presentiment of disaster, which was only too real: the fluid had just struck the house of a poor workman, and left a scene of frightful destruction behind it.

The roof had been carried off, the chimney destroyed, the windows reduced, so to speak, to atoms, the principal door smashed and hurled to a distance; of the furniture there was nothing left but shapeless wreckage. But what was most extraordinary is, that this catastrophe only cost the life of one person, while all that were in the house might well have been killed.

Three children, sleeping in an upper storey, found themselves thrown outside the house without knowing how they got there, but safe and sound, though the bed was broken to pieces. The father and mother were asleep on the ground floor, with two little children, one of whom was at the breast. This latter was flung out of his cradle and thrown against the wall, without being hurt.

At this moment the mother sprang out of bed to succour those dear to her, but while the poor woman was in the act of lighting a candle, the lightning struck her lifeless on the floor. The husband, who was in the bed with another child, only felt a severe shaking. The lightning, having accomplished its work of destruction, finally broke an opening in the lower part of the wall, went into the stable adjoining the house, and there killed the only cow that was in it.

In the month of August, 1868, at Liége, Rue du Calvaire, at the point where the mountain of St. Laurent is highest, lightning first of all struck two earthenware chimney-pots which were higher than the roofs. One of these pots was thrown to the ground and broken, the other disappeared. Then the electric spark ripped off a great part of the roof. All the tiles were scattered round the house. A young servant slept in a garret under the roof; the lightning penetrated into the garret through a little hole in the wall just above the head of the maid's bed; the latter was flung into the middle of the room without the slightest bruise, though the wood of the bed was bored through in two places.

From there, the spark going through the wall again, went down to the ground floor, following the gutter pipe, which it broke. It re-entered the house by making a little hole in the wall, pulled off the plaster which was round two nails holding up a mirror, broke part of the frame; again left the room, entered a little room adjoining where six people were sleeping—the father, the mother, and four young children; pierced the wall to enter a locksmith's, scattered all the tools, tore out a drawer, broke it into a thousand pieces, and threw the contents on the floor, broke all the panes of glass; again went through the wall, went to a hutch with a rabbit in it, killed the animal, and at last went into the garden, where it dug a double trench several feet long.

The house was occupied by two families of ten persons, none of whom were struck. Terrified by the report they rose instantly; the smell of smoke filling all the rooms told them of the danger they had just escaped.

On another occasion one sees the woodwork of the chimney burnt, as well as a press, a looking-glass, and a clock badly injured by the lightning; which before retiring, and by way of being a good joke, turns a felt hat upside down, and unscrews the andirons.

Examples of this kind are very numerous. We constantly speak of the caprices of the lightning, but what name could one give to anything so burlesque or incomprehensible as the following:—

In the month of July, 1896, lightning fell in the village of Boulens, on a cottage almost covered with thatch. Entering through the chimney, which it destroyed, it first threw down a rack, pulling out the hinge which held it up, and making in the place of the said hinge a hole right through the wall. Afterwards it lifted a pot and the lid from the hearth over to the middle of the floor, tearing up some tiles as it went. It broke the latch of the hall door, as well as the key which was in the lock; this latter was found afterwards in a wooden shoe which was under the sideboard. Two canes that were beside the mantelpiece, were laid on the said mantelpiece as if placed there by hand.