Dear Archy,—As a resource against the long ennui of the solitary evenings of commencing winter, I determined to betake me to the neglected lore of the marvellous, the mystical, the supernatural. I remembered the deep awe with which I had listened many a year ago to tales of seers, and ghosts, and vampires, and all the dark brood of night; and I thought it would be infinitely agreeable to thrill again with mysterious terrors, to start in my chair at the closing of a distant door, to raise my eyes with uneasy apprehension towards the mirror opposite, and to feel my skin creep with the sensible “afflatus” of an invisible presence. I entered, accordingly, upon what I thought a very promising course of appalling reading; but, alack and well-a-day! a change has come over me since the good old times, when Fancy, with Fear and Superstition behind her, would creep on tiptoe to catch a shuddering glimpse of Cobbold Fay, or Incubus. Vain were all my efforts to revive the pleasant horrors of earlier years. It was as if I had planned going to the play to enjoy again the full gusto of scenic illusion, and through some unaccountable absence of mind, was attending a morning rehearsal only; when, instead of what I had expected, great coats, hats, umbrellas, and ordinary men and women, masks, tinsel, trap-doors, pulleys, and a world of intricate machinery, lit by a partial gleam of sunshine, had met my view. The spell I had anticipated was not there. But yet the daylight scene was worth a few minutes’ study. My imagination was not to be gratified; but still it might be entertaining to see how the tricks are done, the effects produced, the illusion realised. I found myself insensibly growing philosophical; what amused me became matter of speculation—speculation turned into serious inquiry—the object of which shaped itself into “the amount of truth contained in popular superstitions.” For what has been believed for ages must have something real at bottom. There can be no prevalent delusion without a corresponding truth. If the dragons, that flew on scaly wings and expectorated flames, were fabulous, there existed nevertheless very respectable reptiles, which it was a credit to a hero or even a saint to destroy. If the Egyptian worship of cats and onions was a mistake, there existed nevertheless an object of worship.
Among the immortal productions of the Scottish Shakspeare,—you smile, but that phrase contains the true belief, not a popular delusion; for the spirit of the poet lived not in the form of his productions, but in his creative power and vivid intuition of nature; and the form even is often nearer you than you think: See the works of imaginative prose writers, passim.
Well, among the novels of Scott, I was going to say, none perhaps more grows upon our preference than the Antiquary. In no one has the great Author more gently and more indulgently, never with happier humour, displayed the mixed web of strength and infirmity of human character, (never, besides, with more facile power evoked pathos and terror, or disported himself in the sublimity and beauty of nature.) Yet gentle as is his mood, he misses not the opportunity, albeit in general he betrays an honest leaning towards old superstitions, mercilessly to crush one of the humblest. Do you remember the Priory of St. Ruth, and the pleasant summer party made to visit it, and the preparation for the subsequent rogueries of Dousterswivel, in the tale of Martin Waldeck, and the discovery of a spring of water by means of the divining rod?
I am disposed, do you know, to rebel against the judgment of the novelist on this occasion,—to take the part of the charlatan against the author of his being, and to question, whether his performance last alluded to might not have been something more and better than a trick. Yet I know not if it is prudent to brave public opinion, which has stamped this pretension as imposture. But, courage! I will not flinch. I will be desperate, with Sir Arthur, defy the sneeze of the great Pheulphan, and trust to unearth a real treasure in this discredited ground.
Therefore leave off appealing to the shade of Oldbuck, and listen to a plain narrative, and you shall hear how much truth there is in the reputed popular delusion of the divining rod.
I see my tone of confidence has already half-staggered your disbelief; but pray do not, like many other incredulous gentry, run off at once into the opposite extreme. Don’t let your imagination suddenly instal you perpetual chairman of the universal fresh-water company, or of the general gold-mine-discovery-proprietary-association. What I have to fell you falls very far short of so splendid a mark.
But perhaps you know nothing at all about the divining rod. Then I will enlighten your primitive ignorance.
You are to understand, that, in mining districts, a superstition prevails among the people, that some are gifted with an occult power of detecting the proximity of veins of metal, and of underground springs of water. In Cornwall, they hold that about one in forty possesses this faculty. The mode, of exercising it is very simple. They cut a hazel twig that forks naturally into two equal branches; and having stripped the leaves off, they cut the stump of the twig, to the length of three or four inches, and each branch to the length of a foot or something less: for the end of a branch is meant to be held in each hand, in such a manner that the stump of the twig may project straight forwards. The position is this: the elbows are bent, the forearms, and hands advanced, the knuckles turned downwards, the ends of the branches come out between the thumbs and roots of the forefingers, the hands are supinated, the inner side of each is turned towards its fellow, as they are held a few inches apart. The mystic operator, thus armed, walks over the ground he intends exploring, with the full expectation, that, when he passes over a vein of metal, or underground spring of water, the hazel fork will move spontaneously in his hands, the point or stump rising or falling as the case may be. This hazel fork is the divining rod. The hazel has the honour of being preferred, because it divides into nearly equal branches at angles the nearest equal.
Then, assuming that there is something in this provincial superstition, four questions present themselves to us for examination.
Does the divining fork really move of itself in the hands of the operator, and not through motion communicated to it by the intentional or unintentional action of the muscles of his hands or arms?