iJtS PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. [aNNO J 764. 



viewed from the outside of the church, is seen to have spread round most of the 

 lower part of the spire, so that it seems in great danger of falling. The next 

 stroke is about 4 feet below : at this place 4 iron bars lie horizontally across tlie 

 spire, and are tied together by chain bars which are inclosed in the stonework : 

 where the end of one of the cross bars is inserted in the stone, the lightning has 

 burst open a hole, and when the same is viewed at the outside, a great part of 

 the corniche appears to be broken off. Where the two iron bars serving to 

 support the top of the windows meet and are joined together, the lightning 

 accumulated in them has broken off the pier by which they were inclosed. A 

 bar of iron, which served to support the top of the window in the same manner 

 as those last mentioned, 21 inches long clear of the stonework, and half an 

 inch thick, is broken ; and the stones immediately above it are shattered and 

 disjointed. The sills of two windows of this story are torn off from iron bars 

 which lay beneath them. 



•io.iAn iron bar, N° 1 , about 25 inches long, was inclosed Q inches deep in- the 

 stone-work of the pier, separating the east arch from the arch next it towards 

 the north : the end of this bar joins at a right angle another bar, N° 2, which 

 is laid across the arch. The lightning accumulated in the iron N° 1, which 

 was inclosed in the stone-work, has burst off all the stone that surrounded it, 

 and part of the pier adjoining. The flaw is continued downwards, meeting with 

 smaller iron cramps in its way. At the next arch, lying immediately under the 

 last mentioned one, an iron was inclosed in the stone in the same manner as the 

 bar at N° 1 : the stone is torn off from this iron exactly in the same manner 

 as at N° 1 : but the damage has not reached much farther than the stone 

 which was contiguous to, and covered this bar. At the bottom of this arch the 

 sill stone, which covered some cramps of iron, is torn off from its place. At 

 the next arch under this, the force of the lightning seems to have been much 

 diminished, a small part of one stone only being broken. 



_»t From the wall at the west side of the south window of the belfry some stones 

 are thrown down : one chalky stone in particular is reduced into an impalpable 

 powder, and the wall under the west window is almost covered with the powder : 

 this stroke seems to have been directed towards the bells, one of which is very 

 near the place damaged : the bells have not been examined ; nor can they, it is 

 said, without danger of shaking the spire by their motion. This is the lowest 

 mark which is left of the effects of the lightning. 



In every part that is damaged, the lightning has acted as an elastic fluid, 

 endeavouring to expand itself where it was accumulated in the metal : and the 

 effects are exactly similar to those which would have been produced by gun- 

 powder pent up in the same places, and exploded. Among many other stones 

 thrown to a considerable distance by these explosions, one weighing above JO 



