238 Old Bays on the Farm 



to any special faculty in the dowser or has the 

 twig itself anything to do with it? Held in bal- 

 anced equilibrium the forked twig, in the dowser's 

 hands, moves with sudden and often violent mo- 

 tion and the appearance of actual life in the twig 

 itself, though regarded as mere stage-play by some 

 is popularly associated as the. cause of the water- 

 finder's success. 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 stick is to act as an 

 index of some material or other mental disturb- 

 ance within him, which otherwise he could not 

 interpret. ' ' 



Another authority states: Dowsers sometimes 

 do not use any rod. Some again use a willow rod 

 or withy, others a hazel twig, others a beech or 

 holly twig or one from any other tree. It is 

 repudiated that any electric force is involved, that 

 water-finding is due to mechanical vibration set up 

 by the friction of the moving water acting upon 

 the sensitive ventral diaphragm of certain deli- 

 cately framed persons through the medium of the 

 twig used. 



There you have what the bulging foreheaded 

 chaps have to say on the subject, but there are 

 modern scientists who hold that there is nothing 

 in the theory or ''alleged" science of water-finding 

 at all. Maybe these latter are in the pay of well- 

 drilling outfits and windmill and pump manufac- 

 turers, who knows? 



