What was that?
The hempen string began to bristle like the hair of one electrified. Was it the wind? Was it electricity?
Benjamin Franklin now touched the key with thrilling emotion, while his son looked on with an excited face. It was a moment of destiny not only to the two experimenters in the dashing rain, but to the world. If Franklin should receive a spark from the key, it would change the currents of the world's events.
Flash!
It came clear and sharp. The heavens had responded to law—to the command of the human will guided by law.
Again, another spark.
The boy touches the key. He, too, is given the evidence that has been given to his father.
The two looked at each other.
"Lightning is electricity," said Silence Dogood. "It can be drawn away from points of danger; no one need be struck by lightning if he will protect himself."
"God himself," once said a writer, "could not strike one by lightning if one were insulated, without violating his own laws."