Natural History, 8fC. 191 



out and remained insensible for half an hour. When examined, 

 the place on which he felt the blow was found very red but un- 

 wounded ; he very speedily recovered. 



The two brothers were sitting side by side when struck ; the 

 lightning first reached the head of the elder brother, tore his velvet 

 cap into several pieces, glanced over the temporal bone about an 

 inch above the left ear, then behind that car, and flaying the skin 

 slightly, descended to the neck ; it traversed the nape of the neck 

 obliquely, and ascended to ihe right ear, the interior of which was 

 as if scratched ; it then went by the right shoulder, beneath the 

 chin, over the right breast along the arm, and returning to the 

 back, descended along the vertebral column to the sacrum. In 

 this last part of its course, the skin was not torn, but only slightly 

 raised, and much reddened; marks of the same kind were across 

 the arms, and with the torn clothes, shewed the zig-zag path of 

 the lightning as it had passed alternately from the right side of 

 the younger brother to the left side of the elder. It continued its 

 course on the former from the part where it had come in contact 

 with some pieces of metal contained in his pocket, and at which 

 place it had raised the skin of the muscles of the side, for a space 

 as large as a hand ; it then crossed the stomach to ihe left side, 

 and passed over the internal .surface of the thigh, knee, and calf of 

 the leg. The width of the trace marked by the lightning, was ge- 

 nerally about two inches ; the wounds were most extensive and 

 deep at the intersections of this trace ; many of them were very 

 painful, and suppurated abundantly; the skin had been closely 

 rolled up on the right and left by the rapid passage of the lightning. 

 The wounds did not bleed ; and on healing, those phenomena only 

 took place which accompanied the simple formation of skin. 

 Nothing indicated a lesion of the organs due to fire or heat, but 

 the effect was just such as would have been produced by the pas- 

 sage of a bullet over the surface. 



'Ihe two brothers, on becoming sensible, felt excessively sick, 

 and after drinking some tea, vomited several times, throwing out a 

 little blood. No fever occurred. The eldest was quite deaf on 

 the day of the accident, but recovered his hearing, in part, on the 

 morrow. No paralysis occurred in the limbs struck by the light- 

 ning, and the wounds cicatrized in a few weeks. 



The accident happened in May, 1821. Twelve months after- 

 wards, the elder brother remained affected by deafness, which 

 varied with the weather ; he had a strong tendency to sleep, and 

 sometimes slept twenty-four hcurs if not awakened. The younger, 

 ultimately, had an inflammatory fever, and was subject to a perio- 

 dical depression, of which he had previously felt nothing; and, gene- 

 rally, a much stronger impression hiid been made on the nervous 

 system of both, than from the vigour of their constitution might 

 have been expected. — Bib. Univ. xxv. 318. 



