VOL. v.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 527 



and a fearful thunder-clap, which lighted down through the lesser steeple upcm 

 the body of St. Nicholas Church, and through the round large hole in the 

 upper vault within the same, in the shape of a black fiery ball, directly upon the 

 altar, causing such a hideous crack, fire-flash, smoke and damp tliere, as if 

 many fire balls had been thrown down from the said vault, and had burst all at 

 once; causing a dismal consternation among the people in the church, and leaving 

 a bad sulphureous smell behind. The candle on the south-side of the altar was 

 put out by the blow, the other remained burning. Two of the chalices were 

 overthrown, and the wine spilt, and the wafers scattered about; but the empty 

 chalice stood firm. All three were somewhat smutted at the foot, and one of 

 them a little bent, and pierced through in two places, as if by hail-shot; the 

 wafer-boxes were likewise a little smutted towards the bottom. The church 

 book was flung on the inner passage: The covers of the altar were singed in 

 divers parts, as by powder, and somewhat burned and smutted here and there, as 

 also torn in some places. A strong piece of wainscot, with a picture on it, be- 

 hind the great altar, was split in two. Of the church clock in the west-end, 

 at the same time, both the brass and iron-wires of the whole and quarter-hours 

 hammer were partly broken, and the rest could not be found; and an oaken 

 post fixed in the wall for the support of the dial, was half torn, and beneath the 

 same several bricks were struck out of the two head pillars supporting the 

 steeple. On the top of the southern steeple, an oaben gutter and a strong 

 beam and supporter were shattered, and fell dangerously, but that one part of 

 it held fast yet by one nail. 



One of the ministers, though sitting near the altar to the south, had no hurt 

 Divers of the people seated round about the altar fell down to the ground with 

 the fright. One youth that stood near the minister's pew, not being able to 

 recover his senses, was carried home. On the north side of the altar, four per- 

 sons fell down, and one of the oaken seats being split, the person sitting on it 

 was much more hurt by it than any other. Some that stood in or by the 

 belfry, near the clock, were slightly hurt here and there ; and among them a 

 mariner, leaning on a lined oaken seat there, had his right arm bruised; and 

 another man, though but slightly hurt, yet could not remember how he got 

 home from church. 



The church dial was also much smutted in sundry parts, the gilt figures so 

 soiled that they could scarcely be discerned. The gilt weather-cocks, upon both 

 the steeples, were likewise smutted on the one side of their tails, without any 

 other mark. Nor could it be in the least discovered, in either of the steeples, 

 which way the claps entered, by all the search that was made. 



Eight persons only were hurt : of these the following particulars were ob- 



