34 
FETCH : 
by the very thin stratum of air then intervening between the 
clouds and earth. 
On the other hand, Dr. A. Ernst wrote from Venezuela, 
where he had resided for twenty -two years : — - 
Thunderstorms are very frequent during the rainy season. 
They break out generally in the afternoon, about the time of the 
daily maximum of heat, whilst they are extremely rare in the 
morning (I only witnessed one case) and during the night. Statis- 
tics of accidents do not exist, nor are there many lightning rods 
in use (in Caracas about half a dozen). But there are certain 
regions where the former are far from being uncommon, as, for 
instance, the country round the Lake of Valencia and the plains 
or llanos to the north of the Orinoco. In these a considerable 
number of cattle are killed by lightning every year, and I know 
also of several cases where houses were destroyed and people 
killed. The herds of cattle crowd together as soon as a thunder- 
storm begins, and the animals remain during the whole time with 
their heads down to the ground, thus avoiding instinctively that 
their pointed horns should act as lightning conductors {sic). In 
the neighbourhood of Maracay, at the eastern end of the Lake of 
Valencia, accidents occur almost every year Near 
Caracas accidents are comparatively rare. During all the years 
of my residence here no more than six have come to my knowledge ; 
in three of them some damage was done to buildings, in two cases 
large trees were split, and in one (October, 1882) a ploughman was 
killed while at work in the field, together with his two oxen, his 
driving stick (about four yards long and shod with an iron point) 
having acted as a lightning conductor. 
To the above may be added the following extract from a 
recent number of the same Journal (‘‘Nature,” Vol. 94, page 
261) l'- 
in Symons’s Meteorological Magazine for July last (1914), 
Mr. L. C. W. Bonacina asked readers who had been in India 
whether lightning casualties, notwithstanding the severity of 
tropical storms, are not much rarer there than with us. He 
pointed out that many persons agree that thunderstorms in 
England are much more dangerous than in India. In the issue 
for October a correspondent (G. G.) states that in the course of 
his travels in various parts of India during a period of several 
years he had only known, or heard of, one case of death by 
lightning, though a few high buildings, notably near Delhi, and 
tall trees in mountain districts had been struck. He, therefore, 
answers Mr. Bonacina’s question in the affirmative, the reason 
being given that thunderstorms occur higher up in the air. He 
states that he has never seen lightning in India so near the earth 
as in England. 
It will be seen that the information elicited in 1914 is 
practically the same as that of thirty years earlier, and is 
