Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 19 November 1885 — Lightning. [ARTICLE]

Lightning.

The cause of death by lightning is the sudden absorption of the electric current. When a thunder cloud which is highly charged with positive electricity hangs over any place the earth beneath it becomes abnormally negative, and the body of any animal standing under the cloud will partake of this influence. If in this condition a discharge fakes place from the cloud, the restoration of the equilibrium wiU be sudden and violent—or, in the language of hypothesis, the electric fluid will rush up into the body from the earth with such force as to produce death. And this is what is meant by being “struck by lightning.”— lnter Ocean.