1. Read it slowly. Do not skim over parts and chapters as if the fire were in the house and you had just a minute left to reach the very last line.

3, Do not attempt to read further than Part First - "Preliminaries" - before being absolutely conversant with the Physiology of Palmistry, as laid down by Des-barrolles, and with the Map of the Hand. Let every technical term - and there are but few - be branded in your mind once for all, before attempting to interpret them.

3. T11 your first reading of the Book leave out the following chapters and interspersed paragraphs:

The Leading Types of Hands.

The Signatures of the Mounts,

The Cases (in smaller type) scattered through the book.

The Lines and Signs on Fingers and Thumb, and, finally,

The Piilmistic Dictionary,

Reserve those for a second, leisurely reading. You will enjoy them better and it is only then that they will prove really profitable.

4. Read consecutively and refrain from looking ahead to satisfy your - or somebody else's - curiosity. This jumping from one half-digested subject to another is the surest way to get tired - if not disgusted - with the whole study. Remember that Palmistry is a language and that it has to be learned, like any other language, by gradually assimilating, first the elements - the letters - then the syllables, the words, the sentences, the paragraphs, the pages, the volumes. Fast work, in this case, is no work at all: indeed, it has destroyed the ambitions of more would-be palmists than any other mistake ever made by them.

5. Finally, when you will have decided to take this book as your Guide to Palmistry, attach yourself to it with a will, until you have mastered its contents from cover to cover. While performing this task do not open any other work on the subject; listen to no other teacher. This safeguard against a "confusion of tongues" applies just as truly to any book and any teacher you may choose instead of the present ones. There can be but one commander, when a fortress is to be stormed; but one- initiator at a time into the realms of such a delicate science as Modern, Orthodox Palmistry.

To these few paragraphs of advice, warning, encouragement, there remains only for me to add my earnest wishes that you will extract from the study of "THE PRACTICE OF PALMISTRY FOR PROFESSIONAL PURPOSES" some of the delight - and mental profit - I have derived from my long and daily intercourse with the masterly works of d'Arpentigny and Desbarrolles, the only teachers worth listening to, the sole and direct inspirators of the present book.

Comte C. de Saint-Germain.

43 Auditorium. Building, Chicago, November 1, 1897.