These proceedings give proof of exquisitely delicate feelings; it is a pity the lightning does not always behave in the same way.
Wires, and particularly bell-wires, make the most agreeable playthings for the lightning, judging from the frequency with which they are struck.
Sometimes, in the middle of a fearful thunderstorm, the doorbell is violently rung; the porter rushes to open the door for the impatient visitor, only to receive a shock of lightning by way of salvo. The mysterious hand which pulled the bell is already far away; but it has left its impress on the bell, and the guiding ray follows the metal wire in all its windings, passing through holes no bigger than the head of a pin. The wires are often melted into globules, and scattered around in all directions.
The Abbé Richard has seen globules from a bell-wire fall into coffee cups, and become embedded in the porcelain, without the latter being any the worse.
Metal wires supporting espaliers and vines are often compromising to the safety of their neighbourhood, especially when they are against a house.
Without renouncing the succulent peach, or the golden chasselas grapes, propped on espaliers, we ought to see that they are so arranged that they do not act as lightning-conductors to our habitation.
In August, 1868, in a farm amongst the mountains near Lyons, lightning fell at a distance of about fifteen metres from a dwelling where there were four people; the meteor, conducted by the wire supporting a vine on a trellis, followed it into the house, and knocked the four people down.
One could almost believe that lightning takes a certain pleasure in looking at its diaphanous and fugitive form in the mirrors hung as ornaments in our drawing-rooms.
In 1889, a very coquettish flash of lightning rushed to a mirror, breaking more than ten openings in the gilt frame. Then it evaporated the gilding, spreading it over the surface of the glass, while on the silvered back the evaporation of this latter metal produced the most beautiful electric traceries.
Sometimes the tinfoil or pieces of melted glass are thrown to a great distance; and at times the fusion of the glass is so complete that the débris hangs down like little stalactites.