This bile in the blood is a constant irritant in its course, and in addition to poisoning the blood and tissues, it produces its corresponding irritating influence on the nerves, brain, and temper. It gradually lessens the strength of a muscular heart, and in time we find our pump becoming weak and irregular, while the force of the blood stream itself diminishes. Thus is added in chronic cases a paleness to the yellow skin, and we have the cold-blooded, bilious person, a most distressing combination. The person plagued with bile cannot be joyous, bright, and happy as our pink-skinned subject. He is held down by a weight that seems about to crush him; he is moody, melancholy, takes a dark view of life, and has "the blues." He constantly crosses the bridges before he gets to them. He becomes morose, silent, and forms the habit of shunning society and gayety in every form. His brain is clogged by bilious poisoning, and its views become poisoned. He sees no bright side to anything, but revels in gloom, mystery, and superstition. He takes, in other words, a sickly, distorted point of view, and soon inclines to seek seclusion, and gives way to gloom and despondency. The bile irritates the nerves, so the yellow-skinned subject is cross, irritable, and consequently not a pleasant companion.

His is, indeed, an unhappy lot, and you should be full of tender pity and humor his moods, for he is in reality a sick man. These facts cannot fail to impress your mind with the yellow color, its cause and qualities. Now when you detect it in the palm, the nails, and lines you have an aggravated case. If the yellow is not pronounced, yet still slightly visible, things are working in that direction, and while you may not be able, at the time of the reading, to say that yellow qualities have reached their full control, you know they are started, and should, if possible, be stopped at once.

Thus in hands the yellow color will distort all the Mounts. Jupiter becomes saddened and depressed. Saturn is the yellow Mount naturally; pronounced yellow color will bring this Mount to excess; Apollo is shorn of his brilliancy, Mercury is nervously bilious, Mars becomes an unbearable fellow, the Moon becomes cold and gloomy, and Venus has her physical powers destroyed. Remember always what I have said about the tanned color of hands, for you must not ascribe yellow qualities to a person who has merely been on a summer vacation and has not yet "bleached out"; also be watchful for natives of foreign climates whose hands are yellow by nature, but when you do find the color shown on a hand that should be pink it will warn you to look out for one whose view of life is, to say the least, abnormal.

We next consider the blue or purple color found in some hands. Going back to our source of information on the question of color, we find that blueness or purple color is caused by improper circulation of the blood, not necessarily a poor quality, however. We find it chiefly useful to consider this blue color from its health side, as it is a fact that beyond showing physical weakness the poor circulation does not in any marked degree affect the temperament. So you will regard blue color as a health indication, showing an impairment of the strength of the circulation. The white hand showing coldness, pink the normal condition, red excessive blood supply, and yellow poisoned blood, is followed by blue color, showing a sluggish condition of the circulation, indicating that the heart's pulsation is weak, and insufficient to move the blood rapidly, and that it is consequently travelling through its proper channels too slowly, so slowly in fact that it is producing a clogging of the stream, called in medical parlance congestion.

This is the physiological action which causes blueness of the skin, and it is a most important matter to note, because, when the sluggishness of the flow in the blood stream is sufficiently pronounced to show in the blueness of the hand, the feebleness of the heart action has already reached a dangerous stage. When we study the nails we shall find much to add to this question on the subject of heart trouble, but in merely considering the color of the hand, you must in discovering blue color be at once on your guard for a weak heart. Sometimes you will find blue spots in the palm. These show temporary derangement of the circulation, but it has not reached the chronic state shown by blueness all over the palm. These blue spots can be scattered by brisk rubbing of the hands : the settled blue color cannot. Your handling of a subject with this blue color must be very judicious. It will not do to blurt out, "You have heart disease." I know of one case in which the subject nearly died on receiving such a statement, and only prompt medical attention prevented a fatality.

Handle gently, don't excite; recognize that you are dealing with a very delicate person, and if you must touch on the heart at all, say, "Your blood is not circulating very freely this morning." Your client will then tell you he has a weak heart, and all danger of shock will be avoided. Here again we find tact and refined sensibilities necessary to good practice.

After our study of color it must be plain that I have not overstated the great importance of its mastery, and only by a proper understanding of the great part blood circulation plays in human life can you ever read the fine print of Palmistry.