ay be either a subconscious suggestion or an actual
impression (obscure in its nature) from an external object or an
external mind; both sorts of stimulus are possible, so that the dowser
himself may make false inferences (and fail) by supposing that the
stimulus is an external object (like water). The divining-rod being thus
"an indicator of any sub-conscious suggestion or impression," its
indications, no doubt, may be fallacious; but Professor Barrett, basing
his conclusions upon observed successes and their greater proportion to
failures than anything that chance could produce, advances the
hypothesis that some persons (like the professional dowsers) possess "a
genuine super-normal perceptive faculty," and that the mind of a good
dowser, possessing the idiosyncrasy of motor-automatism, becomes a blank
or _tabula rasa_, so that "the faintest impression made by the object
searched for creates an involuntary or automatic motion of the
indicator, whatever it may be." Like the "homing instinct" of certain
birds and animals, the dowser's power lies beneath the level of any
conscious perception; and the function of the forked twig is to act as
an index of some material or other mental disturbance within him, which
otherwise he could not interpret.

It should be added that dowsers do not always use any rod. Some again
use a willow rod, or withy, others a hazel-twig (the traditional
material), others a beech or holly twig, or one from any other tree;
others even a piece of wire or watch-spring. The best dowsers are said
to have been generally more or less illiterate men, usually engaged in
some humble vocation.

Sir W. H. Preece (_The Times_, January 16, 1905), repudiating as an
electrician the theory that any electric force is involved, has recorded
his opinion that water-finding by a dowser is due to "mechanical
vibration, set up by the friction of moving water, acting upon the
sensitive ventral diaphragm of certain exceptionally delicately framed
persons." Another theory is that water-finders are "exceptionally
sensitive to hygrometric influences." In any case, modern science
approaches the problem as one concerning which the facts have to be
accepted, and explained by some natural, though obscure, cause.

See for further details Professor Barrett's longer discussion in parts
32 (1897) and 38 (1900) of the _Proceedings of the Society for
Psychical Research_.

FOOTNOTE:

[1] _La Baguette divinatoire_ (Paris,