Naturally enough, people are curious to discover when they are going to die, how they can achieve riches, why they do not get along with blondes, where they should travel. Since centuries before Tut of the Egyptians, a canny minority has been answering these more-or-less cosmic riddles for the curious majority. The answers are not always correct, but they have some fine trappings—crimson draperies, crystal balls, ouija boards, wet towels, etc., etc.
Gypsies. As numerous as rabbits in New Zealand are gypsy fortune-tellers in New York this winter. They rent vacant stores as combined homes & professional offices, hang up a few draperies perfumed with sweat & garlic, paw visitors' palms for considerations of $1 to $3 each. If a client wants a really big question answered, he is sometimes instructed to press a $1 bill against the gypsy and blow on it, while the gypsy neatly picks his pocket. For such practices, the police arrested seven gypsy women in uptown Manhattan a fortnight ago, and examined dozens more last week. Be these as they may, palmistry is practiced seriously by many an honest girl.
Swami. Munkund LaL Ghosh and Basu Kumar Ragchi, swart swamis, ran a school for ladies in Los Angeles, Calif. They took their pupils to the peak of a neighboring mountain where the atmosphere was such that "heaven vibrations" and "love control" were easy, and fat reduction a frolic. The regular fee was $35, but several clients were moved to rounder numbers. Fortnight ago, the irate husband of one client whipped Swami Lal Ghosh.
Others. Handwriting experts and phrenologists (inspectors of the hills and gullies of the cranium) are more interested in character analysis than in predicting events. Last week, Ernest Loomis, president of the American Institute of Phrenologists, inspected the files of Manhattan hatters and read character into skulls shaped like bathtubs, pears, eggs. But, said he: "It is the contents and not the symmetry of a skull which counts in the long run." Perhaps that is why numerologists, crystal-gazers, table-tippers, ouija-board-pushers, rhythmical dancers and all-round yogis stop at nothing in time, space, mind or matter. Then there is the New World Water Cult, with rooms in New York, Philadelphia and Cleveland, whose members sit with their bare feet in hot water and with cold wet towels around their heads, concentrating on questions for the Water Master to answer.