XPath contains(text(),’some string’) doesn’t work when used with node with more than one Text subnode

The <Comment> tag contains two text nodes and two <br> nodes as children.

Your xpath expression was

//*[contains(text(),'ABC')]

To break this down,

1. * is a selector that matches any element (i.e. tag) — it returns a node-set.
2. The [] are a conditional that operates on each individual node in that node set. It matches if any of the individual nodes it operates on match the conditions inside the brackets.
3. text() is a selector that matches all of the text nodes that are children of the context node — it returns a node set.
4. contains is a function that operates on a string. If it is passed a node set, the node set is converted into a string by returning the string-value of the node in the node-set that is first in document order. Hence, it can match only the first text node in your <Comment> element — namely BLAH BLAH BLAH. Since that doesn’t match, you don’t get a <Comment> in your results.

You need to change this to

//*[text()[contains(.,'ABC')]]

1. * is a selector that matches any element (i.e. tag) — it returns a node-set.
2. The outer [] are a conditional that operates on each individual node in that node set — here it operates on each element in the document.
3. text() is a selector that matches all of the text nodes that are children of the context node — it returns a node set.
4. The inner [] are a conditional that operates on each node in that node set — here each individual text node. Each individual text node is the starting point for any path in the brackets, and can also be referred to explicitly as . within the brackets. It matches if any of the individual nodes it operates on match the conditions inside the brackets.
5. contains is a function that operates on a string. Here it is passed an individual text node (.). Since it is passed the second text node in the <Comment> tag individually, it will see the 'ABC' string and be able to match it.