The mizzen-mast of another brigantine was struck by lightning in the roadstead of Zaube. Under the left breast of a sailor who was killed was found imprinted the number 44, which his mates all declared was not there before. These two figures, large and well formed, with a full stop between them, were identical with the same numbers in metal affixed to the rigging of the ship, and placed between the mast and the sailor's bunk, in which he was lying asleep when struck. May it not have been a tattoo-mark in spite of what his companions declared? M. José Maria Dau, of Havana, records that in 1838, in the province of Candaleria, in Cuba, there was found on the right ear and on the right side of the neck of a young man struck by lightning, the reproduction of a horseshoe, which had been nailed up at a short distance from him against a window. These various records lead us to the reflection: first, that ceraunography should form a new branch of physics, well meriting study; secondly, that the facts set forth are sufficiently inverse in their nature to show us that we have before us several quite distinct specimens of phenomena. However, these matters have been a subject for study long before our day. A priest, P. Lamy, of the Congregation of Saint Maur, published in 1696 an excellent little work,[2] informed by the most lucid common sense upon the curious effects of lightning--then a text for the most superstitious commentaries. Voltaire could not have reasoned the thing out better. He deals with two very extraordinary cases among others. The first had for scene the Abbey of Saint Médard, at Soissons, on April 26, 1676. A flash of lightning struck the tower of the abbey, went into the clock, penetrated a wall eight feet thick, by a hole conducting an iron rod _à l'aiguille de cadran_, detached two planks, four feet high, and threw them to the extreme end of the dormitory, followed a brass wire stretched along the whole length of the wall, setting fire to it and spreading it out like a ribbon painted to represent a furrow of flames. Here is the author's own description:-- "The most surprising effect, and one which has aroused the curiosity of an immense number of people, is a kind of frieze of all kinds of colours extending along the wall of the dormitory and just above the doors. "The depth of this frieze is about two feet; its length is almost equal to that of the dormitory; the designs upon it are of flames darting up and down from a kind of wide band which occupies the centre of the frieze throughout its length. "I have had a portion of this frieze copied, so as to give the reader an idea of it, but it must be admitted that it is difficult to suggest the variety of _nuances_ in the original. Some people declare that in the midst of all the colours in the flames, faces of men may be descried as well as of marmosets and demons; but those who are less richly endowed with imagination can see nothing of all this."