When lightning meets a metallic bar, it does no harm except on entering and departing. On the other hand, when several people form a chain, holding hands, if the first touches the body of a Leyden electrical jar and the last touches the top, the whole circle will instantaneously receive a shock. Only those in the middle receive a less violent one than those who touch the jar. Well, the discharges from the clouds produce similar effects on men and animals.
Arago supports this by the following facts:—
At Flavigny (Côte-d'Or), five horses were in a stable when the lightning penetrated. The two first and the two last perished, the fifth, which was in the middle, was unhurt.
One day lightning fell on an open field on five horses in a line and killed the first and last; the three others were spared.
But we should require a much larger number of proofs before we could be sure of this.
In certain cases, lightning, always fantastic and extraordinary, seems to make a fastidious choice of its victims. It kills one, spares another, strikes a third, does good to a fourth—what a strange game! how fantastic!
Madame la Comtesse Mycielska, of the Duchy of Posen, wrote to me recently—
"During a storm which took place in the month of August, 1901, lightning entered by a half-open door into a stable where there were twenty cows, and killed ten. Beginning with that which was nearest the door, the second was spared, the third killed, the fourth was uninjured, and so on. All the uneven numbers were killed, the others were not even burnt. The shepherd who was in the stable at the time of the shock, got up unhurt. The lightning did not burn the building, although the stable was full of straw."
We have given a similar case in the chapter on Fireballs. A propos of this, M. Elisee Duval, of Criquetot l'Esneval (Seine-Inférieure), relates a very remarkable case. On June 20, 1892, lightning fell on the telegraph poles of Havre and Étretat. A dozen were thrown over, and the curious part is that every second one was knocked down.
Here is a more extraordinary case still. We were not aware that thunder could distinguish between colours, and that it has its preferences amongst them. Well, we need no longer be surprised at this. Here we have a case where the fluid declares itself distinctly in favour of black. It was at Lapleau in Corrèze. One day thunder fell on a grange full of hay and straw, and covered with thatch, without setting it on fire. Then it went to the sheepfold and killed seven black sheep, and left the white alone.