This method of divining was not frequently
practised, not through want of faith in its efficacy, but through
superstitious terror, for the movement of the key was regarded as
evidence that some unseen dread power was present, and so overpowering
occasionally was the impression produced that the young woman who was
chief actor in the scene fainted. The parties holding the key and Bible
were generally old women, whose faith in the ordeal was perfect, and
who, removed by their age from the intenser sympathies of youth, could
therefore hold their hands with steadier nerve. It is only when firm
hands hold it that the turning takes place, for this phenomenon depends
upon the regular and steady pulsations in the fingers, and when held
steadily the ordeal never fails.
There were various other methods for divining or consulting fate or
deity. M'Tagart refers to a practice of divining by the staff. When a
pilgrim at any time got bewildered, he would poise his staff
perpendicularly, and there leave it to fall of itself; and in whatever
direction it fell, that was the road he would take, believing himself
supernaturally directed.
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