CULT OF THE OCCULT

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 96, 11 April 1908, Page 4

CULT OF THE OCCULT

LONDON INVADED 131 ARMY 01' CLAIRVOYANTS. The West End of London is once overrun by an army of clairvoyants, cry>tal-ga/.ei>, and soothsayers. The police prosecution* of two or three years ago caused a temporary stampede l'roni the luxuriously-furnished temples of u;vstery in Bond Street. Fear ot' police interference, however, has died away, and with the opening of the London seasoH tlie dabbler* in the occult have established themselves once | in fashionable \\e>L End streets. At. Oxford Citvu-. within the space of ten j minutes, no fewer than six diU'eiviii sets of >anduich Injards bearing the advertiM-ments ol various clairvoyant * 1 and cry-tal-gazers were counted, and the advertisement columns of the newspapers, more especially the weekly periodicals. indicate that business is llouri-1;-ing. From Wales come* the .story of the police prosecution of a palmist who excreted an extraordinary inlluence over the mitiors of Llanelly. Owing to her predictions of coining disaster, scores of miners refused to enter the mine at Trinwara. The fashionable clientele ot the West End dealer iu futurity .similarly under the spell. (Jases where the railway companies ar ( . asked to change the date on a ticket because the intending passenger lias been warned i>y a clairvoyant not t'J travel on a certain day or by a particular boat are constantly occurring We>t End jewellers, also, have experience of the growing inlluenec of the. occult. The opal has long been eou--1 sidered a stone of ill-omeu, but jewellers are frequently told by their feminine | customers that certain stones would 1 have an evil inllucmv ou their particular case. "Oh, I must not wear sapphires. Madame X warned me against them," N the sort of remark heard in the jewellers' .-hop-. The fashionable West End physician too, can cite from Jiis experience cases where the force of suggestion has resulted iu a nervous patient frightening | herself into illness.