"A highly respectable girl, the lady's maid of a very clever and intelligent friend of mine residing in Hertfordshire, offers, when she is mesmerized, a great many deeply interesting phenomena. She is as guileless and as good a being as can be met with, and is much beloved by her excellent and amiable mistress who has repeatedly addressed me in her case. If a piece of hazel stick or white thorn be presented to Harriet, she grasps it and sleeps mesmerically in less than a minute. The sleep is at first very intense and deep, and then the stick is held so firmly that the spasmodic state of the muscles renders it very difficult for even a powerful bystander to turn it in her hand. Harriet P's impressionability was put to a very useful purpose. Her mistress heard that she had a practice of 'dowsing' for water, and writes thus to a friend, July, 1845: 'We made a carious experiment here, some days since, with Harriet P----. We have very bad water here and have long been unable to find a good spring. Mr. G. has in vain dug and dug for one. I proposed the divining rod; "for" said I, "Dr. Ashburner would not think it a foolish experiment." Harriet P. was willing, so we went forth to a field the most likely one for a spring--Mr. and Mrs. G., myself, and two friends staying here. We put Harriet to sleep with the hazel stick. She grasped it so tightly we were obliged to use the gold chain. She then held it only in one hand, and immediately began to walk, taking her own way. She went very carefully for about twenty yards, then suddenly stopped as if she had been shot. Not a word was uttered by any one. We all looked on, and were not a little surprised to see the rod slowly turn round until her hand was almost twisted backwards. It looked as if it must pain her; still no one spoke. Suddenly she exclaimed, "There! there! don't you see the stick turn? The water is here, under my hand. I see, oh, I see; let me look; don't speak to me; I like to look." "How deep is the water?" said Mrs. G., speaking to Harriet's fingers. "Oh, about three feet; I can't quite tell, but it is here." In a moment, to our astonishment, she sank down on the grass, and took the stick again in her hands. We made a strange group around her, as we were all much astonished to see what we had come there to see. She seemed so like a witch. We marked the place, and, after a few minutes, we awoke her. In the evening she was again mesmerized to sleep, and we asked her what she saw at the spring. "Why, I saw water, water everywhere." "Then," said I, "how do you know where the spring is?" "Oh, because it goes trinkle, trinkle, I know it is there." "Why did you sit down?" "Why, because I was so giddy; it seemed as if all was water but the little piece of ground I stood upon. I saw so much water, all fresh, no sea. I tried to see the sea but could not; I could not at all." Mr. G. caused a large hole to be dug, and just at the depth of three feet the water was found.