"On March 3, 1557, Diane of France, illegitimate daughter of Henri II., then the Dauphin, married François de Montmorency. On the night of their wedding, an oscillating flame came into their bedroom through the window, went from corner to corner, and finally to the nuptial bed, where it burnt Diane's hair and night attire. It did them no other harm, but their terror can be imagined." Perhaps it may be as well to take with a pinch of salt the statement that the lady's attire was burnt in this way without harm to her person, yet there are other authentic stories of a similar kind almost as curious. In 1897, at Linguy (Eure-et-Loire), a man and his wife were sleeping quietly, when suddenly a terrible crash made them jump out of bed. They thought their last hour had come. The chimney, broken to pieces, had fallen in and its wreckage filled the room, the gable-end was put out and the roof threatened to come down. The effects of the thunderbolt in the room itself were less alarming than its effects outside, but were very curious. For instance, bricks from one wall had been dashed horizontally against the wall opposite, with such extraordinary force that they were to be seen imbedded in it up above a dresser upon which pots and pans, etc., were ranged, and within a few inches of the ceiling, while the windows of the room had been smashed into bits, and a looking-glass, detached from the wall, stood on end whole and entire upon the floor, delicately balanced. A chair near the bed, upon which articles of clothing had been placed, had been spirited away to a spot near the door. A small lamp and a box of matches were to be found undamaged upon the floor. An old gun, suspended from a beam, was violently shaken and had lost its ramrod. The thunderbolt actually frolicked over the bed, leaving its occupants more dead than alive from terror but quite unhurt. It passed within a few inches of their heads and passed through a fissure in a partition into an adjoining dairy, where it carried a whole row of milk-cans, full of milk, from one side of the room to another, breaking the lids but not upsetting a single can. It broke four plates out of a pile of a dozen, leaving the remaining eight intact. It carried away the tap from a small barrel of wine, which emptied itself in consequence. It ended by passing out through the window without further breakage, leaving the husband and wife unscathed but panic-stricken. One of the strangest tricks to which lightning is addicted is that of undressing its victims. It displays much more skill and cleverness in such diversions than is to be found in animals or even in many human beings. Here is one of the most curious instances of this on record, as narrated by Morand:-- "A woman in man's costume. A storm suddenly comes on. A flash of lightning strikes her, carries off and destroys her clothes and boots. She is left stark naked, and she has to be wrapped up in a cloth and taken thus to the neighbouring village."