The signs relied upon by Palmists, like those of all other branches of character reading with nature in a normal, not in an abnormal condition: but when abnormal conditions are present, nature always finds some means of manifesting her powers, as in the Case of a person who has lost one eye, the other becomes unusually strong, and the man who possesses only one leg has double the usual amount of strength in it; and when the nervous fluid has only one hand in which to register the workings of the mind and the experience of the individual it is only natural that the one hand becomes doubly expressive: certainly it requires more tact, skill and study on the part of the Palmist, but it has been successfully done many times, and if in itself very interesting. The experience of the writer goes to prove that in such cases the Fate line becomes more than usually expressive, and that events which are present or close at hand are shown by bright redness of the lines, those to come are marked by deep but pale lines; whilst the lines indicating past events are pale and much more in distinct: thus the past, present and future are shown in the one hand.

This method of reading the palm o f a one-handed person holds good, whether the individual was born with only one hand, had lost the hand some years previous to the reading, or possessed the other hand in a paralysed condition (for a paralysed hand cannot indicate the workings of the mind in as much as the electricity, which is the connecting link has been cut of by the paralysis; but it does not hold good in the case of a person who has recently lost a hand.