Posted by Peter Ceresole on December 06, 2013 at 14:59:41 user PeterC.
In Reply to: Re: AR taught me to sail posted by Tom Napier on December 06, 2013 at 11:30:33:
He makes it clear that, whatever Titty's beliefs, she could really have been following physical clues to the water such as the presence of the rushes.
Yes, when I was small the 'rushes' explanation stuck in my mind. Afterwards, I always thought of that hypothesis whenever I encountered a dowsing-type story, although as you say he left it open. Personally, I never knew of anybody use dowsing successfully, but I did read about people who made a good living from it and had a high success rate. I never knew enough about the circumstances (reliability of witnesses, money to be made by telling fibs etc) to dismiss those stories.