Palmistry for All | Page 7

or Artistic Hand 123 The Psychic Hand 123 The Mixed Hand 123
III. Thumbs: The Clubbed Thumb 129 The Supple Jointed Thumb 129 The Firm Jointed Thumb 129 The Waist-Like Thumb 129 The Straight Thumb 129 The Elementary Thumb 129
IV. The Fingers: The Smooth 134 The Square 134 The Knotty 134
V. The Nails: Delicacy of Throat 137 Chest and Bronchial 137 Spinal Weakness 137 Weak Action of the Heart 137 Paralysis 137
VI. The Mounts of the Hand: The Mount of Venus 141 The Mount of Mars 141 The Mount of Jupiter 141 The Mount of Saturn 141 The Mount of the Sun 141 The Mount of Mercury 141 The Mount of the Moon 141
[Illustration: THE LINES OF THE HAND.]

Palmistry for All


PART I--PALMISTRY OR CHEIROMANCY

CHAPTER I
A BRIEF RéSUMé OF THE HISTORY OF THE STUDY OF HANDS THROUGH THE CENTURIES TO THE PRESENT DAY
The success I had during the twenty-five years in which I was connected with this study was, I believe, chiefly owing to the fact that although my principal study was the lines and formation of hands, yet I did not confine myself alone to that particular page in the book of Nature. I endeavoured to study every phase of thought that can throw light on human life; consequently the very ridges of the skin, the hair found on the hands, all were used as a detective would use a clue to accumulate evidence. I found people were sceptical of such a study only because they had not the subject presented to them in a logical manner.
There are hundreds of facts connected with the hand that people have rarely, if ever, heard of, and I think it will not be out of place if I touch on them here. For instance, in regard to what are known as the corpuscles, Meissner, in 1853, proved that these little molecular substances were distributed in a peculiar manner in the hand itself. He found that in the tips of the fingers they were 108 to the square line, with 400 papill?; that they gave forth certain distinct crepitations, or vibrations, and that in the red lines of the hand they were most numerous and, strange to say, were found in straight individual rows in the lines of the palm. Experiments were made as to these vibrations, and it was proved that, after a little study, one could distinctly detect and recognise the crepitations in relation to each individual. They increased or decreased in every phase of health, thought, or excitement, and were extinct the moment death had mastered its victim. About twenty years later, experiments were made with a man in Paris, who had an abnormally acute sense of sound (Nature's compensation for want of sight, as he had been born blind). In a very short time this man could detect the slightest change or irregularity in these crepitations, and through the changes was able to tell with wonderful accuracy about how old a person was, and how near they were to illness, and even death.
The study of these corpuscles was also taken up by Sir Charles Bell, who, in 1874, demonstrated that each corpuscle contained the end of a nerve fibre, and was in immediate connection with the brain. This great specialist also demonstrated that every portion of the brain was in touch with the nerves of the hand and more particularly with the corpuscles found in the tips of the fingers and the lines of the hand.
[Illustration: LORD KITCHENER'S HAND.]
The detection of criminals by taking impressions of the tips of the fingers and by thumb marks is now used by the police of almost every country, and thousands of criminals have been tracked down and identified by this means.
To-day, at Scotland Yard, is to be seen almost an entire library now devoted to books on this side of the subject and to the collections that the police have made, and yet, in my short time, I remember how the idea was scoffed at when Monsieur Bertillon and the French police first commenced the detection of criminals by this method. If the ignorant prejudice against a complete study of the hand were overcome, the police would be greatly assisted by studying the lines of the palm, and acquiring a knowledge of what these lines mean, especially as regards mentality and the inclination of the brain in one direction or another.
It is a well-known fact that, even if the skin be burned off the hands or removed by an acid, in a short time the lines will reappear exactly as they were before, and the same happens to the ridges or "spirals" in the skin of the inside tips of the fingers and thumb.
The scientific use of such a study could also be made invaluable in foreseeing tendencies towards insanity, etc.
Sir Thomas Browne, in