It is utterly impossible, says the practical man, that the ringing of a bell, or the grouping of tea-leaves, or the particular moment at which a picture falls from a wall, can be anything but fortuitous: and it is the sign of a weak and superstitious mind to regard them as anything else.

There can be no purpose or sequence except in matters where we can perceive purpose or sequence.
Of course the practical man must be right; we imply that he is right, since we call him practical, and I have to deplore, therefore, the fact that Frank on several occasions fell into a superstitious way of looking at things.

The proof is only too plain from his own diary--not that he interprets the little events which he records, but that he takes such extreme pains to write them down--events, too, that are, to all sensibly-minded people, almost glaringly unimportant and insignificant.
* * * * * I have two such incidents to record between the the travelers' leaving the Benedictine monastery and their arriving in London in December.

The Major and Gertie have probably long since forgotten the one which they themselves witnessed, and, indeed, there is no particular reason why they should remember it.

Of the other Frank seems to have said nothing to his friends.