"The most surprising effect, and one which has aroused the curiosity of an immense number of people, is a kind of frieze of all kinds of colours extending along the wall of the dormitory and just above the doors.
"The depth of this frieze is about two feet; its length is almost equal to that of the dormitory; the designs upon it are of flames darting up and down from a kind of wide band which occupies the centre of the frieze throughout its length.
"I have had a portion of this frieze copied, so as to give the reader an idea of it, but it must be admitted that it is difficult to suggest the variety of nuances in the original. Some people declare that in the midst of all the colours in the flames, faces of men may be descried as well as of marmosets and demons; but those who are less richly endowed with imagination can see nothing of all this."
On p. 274 is a copy of the design by P. Lamy.
At this period, physicists were of the belief that lightning was "an exhalation of nitre and sulphur, " acting something after the fashion of powder, and able to burn up or throw over everything encountered on its route. In this girdle traced by the lightning, the author sees a scattering of all the constituents of the brass wire, transformed into all kinds of colours due to the dilation of the copper, melted and vaporized over the width of two feet, the colours, in which yellow predominates, varying according to the thickness and the inequalities of the "projection."
The second case examined into by P. Lamy, was that of what happened in the church of Sauveur at Lagny, when it was struck by lightning on July 18, 1689. This is one of the most astounding in the entire history of the subject. Let us see what our author has to tell us:—
"If we were to look for some excuse for the strangeness and diversity of the people's sayings and doings in connection with the Lagny case of lightning, we should assuredly find it in the extraordinary nature of the case itself.
"For what would naturally be the effect upon minds accustomed to see mysteries in the most transparently natural events, minds whose philosophy never goes beyond the senses, when they learn—
"1. That the lightning had not only descended upon the clock-tower of the church, and carried off the slates from its roof, but had struck and overthrown nearly fifty persons inside the edifice, and wrought great havoc on the high altar.