An Account of a Storm of Thunder and Lightning at Norwich, on the 13th of July 1758. By Mr. Samuel Cooper. Communicated by Mr. Joseph Warner, Surgeon of Guy's Hospital, and F. R. S.

VII. An Account of a Storm of Thunder and Lightning at Norwich, on the 13th of July 1758. By Mr. Samuel Cooper *. Communicated by Mr. Joseph Warner, Surgeon of Guy's Hospital, and F. R. S. Read Feb. 15, 1759. ABOUT four o'clock on Thursday afternoon, July 13th 1758, a short but severe thunder-storm, with lightning, fell upon the top of an house standing alone, and belonging to a common garden, on the causeway near Sandling's ferry, in the city of Norwich; struck off the tiles of the roof at the east end, to the space of a yard or two; burnt a very small hole in the middle of a lath, in piercing into the chamber, and then darted to the north-east; ript off the top of an old chair, without throwing it down; snapt the two heads of the bed-posts, rent the curtains, drove against the wall (the front of the house stands due north-east), forced out an upright of a window frame a yard long, three inches broad, and two thick; smote it in a right line into an opposite ditch, ten or twelve yards distant: then struck down on the wall of the chamber, paring off half a foot's breadth of its plastered covering quite down to the floor; lifted up a board of the floor, and leaving an hole of half an inch diameter, pierced thro' by the side of the main beam. * This account is confirmed in almost every circumstance by another communicated to the Royal Society in a letter from Mr. William Arderon, F.R.S. to Mr. Henry Baker, F.R.S. beam into the kitchen, towards the west end of a pewter-shelf; traversed the whole shelf to the east, and melted superficially to the breadth of a shilling six pewter dishes, two plates, and a pewter bason, all standing touching one another: two of the dishes were thrown down, the rest not displaced. Under this, a narrower shelf of pewter plates untouched. In its descent to the floor, knocked down, as she expresses it, an ancient woman sitting in the passage westward of the shelves; who being presently taken up, her shoulders and back were found to be scorched all over, with the hind part of her left leg: the skin almost universally red and inflamed, rimpled in two or three places, but not broken: her shift burnt brown, stocking singed, with its colour of the inside discharged, and the outside unchanged: right foot very painful and bruised, with that shoe struck off, and its upper-leather torn: her gown and other cloaths without any damage. It passed through the same passage without injuring another old woman sitting knee to knee with her companion; but keeping its direction to the north-east, turned on a right angle upon the outer door, split it, and passed through into the open air. On a right line with this passage to the west, and under the same roof, is the wash-house, where stood the master and his man. They saw the woman tumble down, and heard such a violent explosion, that made them both think the whole house must come down: and the man says, with such a blaze, as if all was on fire; but that was but for a moment. To the east of the pewter shelves, and under that part of the roof, where it entered, it rushed into the kitchen closet, by tearing off a wooden but- ton, that was nailed on, and there took some pieces from a Delft dish without throwing it down, broke a quart mug, and from a four-ounce phial half full of oil cut off its empty half part without spilling a drop of the oil. The activity of the lightning was with abated violence to all other points of the compass; but not without some considerable degree of force; for it scraped the plaster off the wall in many different and distant places, both in the chamber and kitchen: and to the south-west of the chamber, where was the window, broke many panes of glass, and tore the lead outwardly, without melting it; and broke two panes of the kitchen window, with its lead, situated under the chamber window. Both kitchen and chamber smelt as strong of sulphur some hours after, as if fumigated with brimstone matches. Sam. Cooper. VIII. Experiments concerning the Encaustic Painting of the Ancients. In a Letter to the Right Honourable George Earl of Macclesfield, President of the Royal Society, from Mr. Josiah Colebrooke, F. R. S. My Lord, Read Mar. 1. The result of experiments (whatever the success attending them may be), in philosophical or mechanical inquiries, is not below the attention of the Royal Society.