Let us proceed with our studies. It is important above all never to take the newspaper narratives on trust without verification. In the month of June, 1897, the following appeared in the newspapers:—
"Photographic Lightning.—A chasseur of the 15th battalion, in barracks at Remiremont, was struck by lightning. He was standing upon a mound not far from a grove of pines, in the midst of ferns. Curious to relate, on the occasion of recording the fact of the man's being dead, it was discovered that his body was covered with punctures imprinted on it by the lightning, and representing the nature and aspect of the branches and plants all round him at the time when he was struck."
I wrote at once to the chef de bataillon for a precise confirmation of this, and received the following reply:—
"M. le Commandant Joppé, commanding officer of the 15th Battalion of Chasseurs, has handed me your letter of June 14th, and asked me to reply to it.
"It is the case that a chasseur of the battalion was struck by lightning on the afternoon of June 4, but it is quite untrue that there was found on his body a photograph of the trees adjoining the spot of the accident. The man's clothes were not affected in any way, and the only traces left by the passage of the lightning, consisted in some slight irregularly shaped burns on the upper part of the hollow of the right temple of linear formation, save for one circular burn measuring from three to four millimetres in diameter, and depressing the skin into the shape of a saucer. There was no lesion on the whole surface of the body.
"Mauny,
"Surgeon-Major 15th Battalion of Chasseurs."
This reply was covered by a note which ran as follows:—
"I thought it desirable that the reply to your letter of the 14th inst. should be made by the surgeon-major of my battalion in order that it might be the more scientifically accurate and authoritative.
"Joppé,
"Chef de bataillon breveté,
"Commanding Officer of the 15th Battalion of the Chasseurs des Vosges."
Clearly, the student of natural phenomena cannot take too many precautions. And yet ... an officer of high rank confided to me recently that "surgeon-majors hardly ever take the trouble to examine bodies thoroughly," and that it is possible that in this case "the examination may have been very superficial." If this be a general rule, there must have been an exception here, as also in the fifth case, to which we shall be coming just now.
The problem is far from being solved, and we can but seek to study it as set forth in a number of instances. Here is a third case:—
On Sunday, August 23, 1903, a certain number of riflemen were practising at the Charbonnières range, near the village of Le Pont, in the valley of Lalle Joux (Canton de Vaud, Suisse), five targets out of six were in use. The targets, distant 300 metres from the firing-line, are placed to the side of a grove of pines. Between stretches an undulating rock-strewn meadow-land. Only the butts are provided with a lightning-conductor, and in it are five markers. There are six telephone wires along the line of fire; they come as far as the stand and go down to within about 50 centimetres of the scorers' seats. Each target has its own telephone bell.
The weather was not stormy, though the sky was somewhat overcast. Firing was going on. At about 3.30 there was a clap of thunder, and lightning struck the electric wires. In the stand twenty-eight men, riflemen, scorers, and spectators, are thrown to the ground in every direction and in every position. Some are quite inert, apparently dead; others, looking as though they were asphyxiated, give out a painful rattling noise from their throats. At the bar, to the side of the stand, no one felt anything—it was not even noticed that there had been a violent stroke of lightning. A kilometre away the band, which had been giving a concert in front of the Hotel de la Triute on the bridge, continued to play. Presently a man reaches them with the report that twenty of the riflemen have been killed. Consternation becomes general, and relief parties are organized. Fortunately the damage done was much less than was supposed.