WATER-DIVINING AT SUVLA BAY.
[To THE EDITOR or TIER " SPECTATOR1 STR,—Will you permit an old reader and admirer of the Spectator to express a little regret that you should have given such prominence to the Suvla Bay water-divining story ? The superstition regarding water- divining dies very hard, and I am afraid the prestige of notice in your columns will do much to revivify it. If all the statements made in the Egyptian Gazette regarding the occurrence of which Sapper Stephen Kelly was the hero were accurate, which may not be the case, they are a long way from proving the possession by him of any occult powers, although he doubtless has, as many so-called " diviners " have, a perfectly honest belief in them himself. Any one interested in this subject should read Sir E. Ray Lankester's chapter upon the divining-rod In Diversions of a Naturalist. Therein will be found a most lucid account of what is known of this very curious superstition. Its explanation has been given by Bacon in The Advancement of Learning : " The root of all
superstition is that to the nature of the mind.of all men it is consonant for the. affirmative or active to affect more than the negative or privative; .so that a: ew times hitting or presence countervails oft-times failing ow absence."—I am, Sir, &c., W. VIIIX GRAHARFi Athenaeum Club, S.W.
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