260 Mr Charles Tomlinson on Lightning Figures. 
visible on the inner surface of each skin.” This looks so very 
much like a joke that I hesitate to quote it; but the authority 
for the statement given by M. Poey is Mr James H. Shaw, 
whose communication was made, it should be remarked, 
forty-five years after the event, and is included in the * Re- 
port of the Council of the British Meteorological Society, read 
at the Seventh Annual General Meeting, May 27, 1857,” 
p- 17. Mr Shaw makes an addition to the above statement, 
which is hardly required if a fac-simile of the surrounding 
scenery were printed on the skins. However, he says that 
“the small field and its surrounding wood were so familiar 
to me and my schoolfellows, that when the skins were shown 
to us, we at once identified the local scenery so wonderfully 
represented.” The authority for this may well indeed be 
Shaw, although I should prefer a slight. variation in the 
spelling. But curiously enough, while I am writing, a friend 
has procured for me a number of the “ Bath Express” for 
Saturday, June 8, 1861, in which is a paragraph headed, 
« Curious Effects of Lightning,” correcting a statement which 
had appeared in the “ Bath Express’ a fortnight before, re- 
specting the occurrence of 1812. The accident is now said, 
on the authority of Mr Wiltshire, ‘‘ on whose farm the occur- 
rence took place,” to have happened at Twinney, not at 
Combe Hay, and it is thus related :—“ About turnip-sowing 
time, in 1812, Mr Wiltshire and his men were engaged in the 
fields, when a violent storm of thunder and lightning came 
on, and three out of four valuable rams, which had taken 
shelter under a tree, were killed. "When the skins reached 
the fellmonger, on the inside of each was found depicted a 
very accurate representation of the tree under which the 
animals had sought refuge.’ Now, in this short extract, we 
have some very important variations from Mr Shaw’s state- 
ment, as adopted by M. Poey. In the first place, the acci- 
dent occurred not at Combe Hay, but at Twinney. Secondly, 
three rams now take the place of six sheep. Thirdly, the 
rams had taken refuge under a tree—Mr Shaw’s sheep were 
in a small field surrounded by trees. Fourthly, M. Poey 
states, that the skins were exposed to public view in Bath— 
Mr Wiltshire says, “when theskins reached the fellmonger’s,’-— 
that is, the man who skinned the sheep saw nothing particu- 
