316 



DISCOVERY 



pottery becomes stiff and grandiose. Plants and 

 animals are rendered in a spiritless, conventionalised 

 manner. Degeneration was rapid, and in L.M. Ill 

 (which represented the last stage of Minoan culture) 

 the potter held his brush quite still and let the spinning 

 pot do the rest. There was no decoration beyond an 

 occasional group of horizontal bands, the mere frame- 

 work of earlier designs. 



There were, of course, other forms of pottery besides 

 vases. Cretan potters, even more than those of to-day, 

 used clay as the material for hardware. Not only 

 bricks, drain-pipes, ornaments, but lamps, kettles, 

 even cupboards and tables, were made of clay. 

 (To be continued) 



Correspondence 



THE METEOROLOGICAL OFFICE AND THE AIR 

 MINISTRY 



To the Editor of Discovery 



Sir, 



Mr. D. W. Horner, in his article on Modern Methods 

 of Weather Forecasting in your September issue, mentions, 

 with some approval, the placing of the Meteorological 

 Office under ttie Air Ministry. Most independent meteor- 

 ologists, and if truth were known most official meteor- 

 ologists also, deplore the fact as little short of disastrous 

 for the best interests of meteorology in this country. 

 Only one side of meteorology' appeals to the aviator, 

 and its other sides are not hkely to come off well when the 

 finances of the Meteorological Office are controlled by the 

 Air Ministry. The meetings of the Meteorological Com- 

 mittee are presided over by an officer in the Ministry 

 who in general will not have had the scientific training 

 to enable him to appreciate meteorological problems 

 outside his own province. Officials in the Meteorological 

 Office are now civil servants, and are debarred from taking 

 part in any pubUc discussion bearing on the work of the 

 office. 'E\ent'\\(i Meteorological Magazine, whictim former 

 times, as Symons's Meteorological Magazine, used to 

 publish abstracts of all papers read before the Royal 

 Meteorological Society, cannot now publish such ex- 

 tracts if they criticise the work of the Office. The Office 

 has been quietly taken over by the Air Ministry without 

 any show of reason, and without any committee of 

 inquiry such as there has always been in the past when 

 there has been any change in the status of the Meteoro- 

 logical Office. 



C. J. P. Cave, 

 Captain late Meteorological Section R.E. 

 DiTCHAM Park, 

 Petersfield. 

 September 7, 1920. 



Sir, 



DOWSING 

 To the Editor of Discovery 



I was interested in your remarks upon water- 

 divining, or dowsing, as you call it, in the September 

 number of Discovery. 



I know very little about dowsing, and certainly I have 

 neither experience nor training in the matter to offer cm 

 opinion of any value on the subject, but I am inclined 

 to agree with your view that there is no physical action 

 between the water underground and the twig. How 

 could there be ? But I disagree with you in this : I do 

 not think that dowsing is a problem for the psychical 

 research people at all. It is a matter for the experimental 

 psychologist. 



My view is that some part of the dowser's mind knows 

 in some waj' all the time the whereabouts of the thing 

 sought for, and this carry-on of his with the twig of hazel 

 in his hands is only (unconsciously, of course) a means of 

 getting the subconscious part of his mind to communicate 

 with the conscious. 



There are probably lots of other ways of dowsing besides 

 using a hazel-twig, and I beUeve that anything al all can 

 be dowsed if the dowser's subconscious mind is set 

 upon wanting it. Here is a thing that happened which 

 seems to bear out this theory. While I wEis reading 

 your remarks, it dawned upon me suddenly that there 

 was a thing in my own home which I might with profit 

 attempt to dowse. About three months ago, I lost or mis- 

 laid a bunch of keys, and search as I would, high or low, 

 I could not find them. I think I must have sought 

 everywhere for them. So I put dowTi your paper, imagined 

 myself a first-class dowser, and joining my hands, as a 

 timid diver might on a cold day pre\ious to his first 

 plunge, began to dowse. In less than twenty seconds I 

 found myself in a very dark pantry rummaging under 

 an old linen overall. There I found a glass jar which in 

 better days had contained chicken-and-ham paste, now 

 filled with screw nails, and hidden in the nails were my 

 keys. I seemed to get there without any let or hindrance, 

 and certainly those keys were the very ones I had sought 

 for in vain. 



Of course, this may be entirely a coincidence. I am 

 inclined to thmk not. 



f. moreton. 



Glenavy, 

 Co. Antrim, 

 September 8, 1920. 



[This letter deals wth an in'^eresting experience. It 

 has, however, nothing to do with dowsing, where the 

 knowledge of the whereabouts of the thing sought cannot 

 be in the mind of the dowser or of anyone with liim. 



Other letters on this subject have been received, for 

 some of which we regret we have no space. Most of 

 these letters deal exclusively with the marvellous things 

 that dowsers have done and can do. What we really 

 want to get at, however, is an explanation of the pheno- 

 mena, and an account of experiments undertaken to test 

 any hypothesis put forward. — Ed.] 



