One day a workman was sheltering under the shed of a kiosque in which there were five men playing cards. He was grazed by lightning. The fluid, after having passed between the players without hurting them, left the kiosque, and removed a shoe from the poor workman, who was petrified with fright. They searched for the shoe which had been confiscated by the fulminant matter, but in vain.
Moreover, lightning seems to have a special predilection for shoes; it seldom respects them, even when it spares the other garments. Sabots, shoes, and even boots are removed, unsewn, un-nailed, cut to pieces, and thrown far away with extraordinary violence. Very often the discharge penetrates into the human body by the head and leaves it by the feet.
During a violent storm (June 8, 1868) a workman was passing near the Jardin des Plantes, when he felt a great oppression on his stomach. He was then knocked down roughly by an irresistible force, and deprived of the use of his senses at the moment of the fall. He was picked up and taken home, and on being examined, his body bore no trace of a wound, and he escaped with a fright. But some days after, when he had recovered from the shock, he remembered that he had worn boots at the time of the accident. These had disappeared, the lightning had stolen them from him, though it acted from a distance. The boots were found in the street, and the soles had the nails completely removed, although they were screwed in and the boots were nearly new.
On May 31, 1904, at Villemontoire (Aisne), a workman was killed on a hay-cock, his clothes were reduced to fragments, and his shoes were not to be found. Two other workmen were wounded, and the cock was set on fire.
On May 11, 1893, lightning broke over the Commune of Chapelle-en-Blezy (Haute-Marne). A young shepherd, who was watching his flock in the fields, was knocked over by the fluid and lost consciousness. When he came to himself he found that his sabots and cap had disappeared.
Arago states that a workman was struck under a pavilion, and that the pieces of his hat were found embedded in the ceiling.
Biot gives the case of a hat which was flung ten paces without a breath of wind.
We could multiply these very curious observations, but we must restrain ourselves so as to remain within the limits of this little book. Did I not say just now that lightning has sometimes—though very rarely—exercised a beneficial influence on sick people it strikes?
Yes; we hear of several cases where thunder has shown itself a rival to the noblest disciples of Esculapius, and where it has worked veritable miracles.
For instance, a person who had been paralyzed thirty-eight years, suddenly, at the age of forty-four, recovered the use of her legs, after a stroke of lightning.