One day towards the end of January 1985a 12-year-old cookery student, Jacqueline Fitzsiomons, was talking to friends in a corridor of the technical college,wher she suddenly complained of burning on her back.Seconds later,she was in flames.Her screams brought horrified staff running to her aid-thery threw her to the ground and tried to put out the fire.But on arrival at hospital Jacqueline was suffering from 18percent burns,and she died 15 days later.

Firemen who investigated her death could find no reason for the way Jacqueline was burnt.They were surprised and puzzled to discover that although her pullover had been on fire, the apron she was wearing over it was undamaged.Because no one had any idea as to what had set Jacqueline on fire ,it seemed possible that this might be a case of spontaneous human combustion (SHC)-the stange phenomenon in which the human body bursts into flames whithout any visible source of fire .

The belief that the body can burst into flames of ites own accord has a long history,and there have been several cases over the past 250 years.One of the earliest cases,that of the 61-year-old Countess Cornelia Bandi,had many typical features.This took place in 1736.

The Countess had gone to bed after supper and,after talking to her maid for an hour or two,she had fallen asleep.When the maid returned to wake her in the morning ,she found a terrible scene.The floor and windows of the bedroom wer covered with a yellowish liquid,and there was a strange smell. About a meter from the bed was a heap of ashes,and two legs,undamaged,still with stockings on .Betwen the legs was a burnt head and everything else was ashes.What wa particularly strange was that nothing else in the room had been damaged by the fire.

This same characteristic was also seen in a 20th century case:that of DR J.Irving Bentley,a retired doctor who had lived in a ground floor flat.The doctor's remains were found in December 1966 by Don Gosnell,who entered the basement of the building to read the gas meter.He was worried by the light blue smoke and the pile of ashes he found in the basement,so he went up to Dr Bentley's flat.There,in the bathroom,he found a large hole burned through the floor,and on the edge of the hole,"a brown leg,from the knee down,like the leg of a doll".Apart from the leg and the pile of ashes in the basement ,no other remains were found.Again there was almost no damage to the bathroom. At the inquest into Dr Bentley's deathe the coroner decided that Bentley had carelessly set fire to himself-probably withe a pipe -and had gone into the bathroom in search of water. He had died from choking on the fumes.

• 6小时掌握学英语的秘诀！——点击看答案
• 专治男女记不住单词的秘密