Little Falls herald. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1889-1950, 1901-01-04
ASTROLOG ]. E KRIS.
THE MODERN SAMPLE sHf 7PER THAN
HE OF THE MIDDLE AGES. 49,,

:: ~ - :.
-. Connection Between the Planet.
:, and the Stock Market ana Who
Have No Trouble In HOOKING We
tim = mr.. ! :,.: -. =. =.
: '"Astrelogy as profession is in a. vast
" more fonrishing condition today than
it was i'm the imiddle ages declared a
we'll known cotton future broker Of this
city. NO, Ina not Joking" he went on
earnestly. ats a cold fact. Back in
the sixteenth century an. astrologer gem
orally ran his telescope foundry in some
rickety old tower, with black cat as a
side partner, and was mighty lucky if he
succeeded in lodging the stake as a
wind up. At present he has a suit Of
rooms in a metropolitan skyscraper, die
tates his correspondence to beautiful
typewriter houris, and does a land office
business in market forecasts at So a head,
know, but millions Of dollars are I'M
immediate direction Of fakirs who pre,
tend. to read the future in, the stars
my attention was first 4 ttracted to the
ders began to receive from an old Gus
toner who had been taking an occasional
) aier: in cotton ever since l had been in
business. He knew nothing about the
intricacies Of the market himself and gen
orally asked my advice before investing:
All of a sudden, however, he changed his
tactics completely. and would come in
with precise and definite instructions,
which he insisted on having carried out to
the letter. At the same time he switched
from the bull to- the bear side Of the mar
ket. / inferred, of course that he had
been investing in some Of the ready made
tips that are hawked about the country,
and, being curious to know the source Of
his information, subjected him; to: a lit
tie pumping. He finally admitted in rath-
er shame faced fashion that he had be.
come a client of Boston astrologer who
called himself Zobara and sent him a
weekly letter OF advice supposed to be
compiled from observations Of the plan
cts. l looked over the fellows circulars
and other literature, and more amazing
lot Of balderdash never laid eyes on. 1t
was a weird tumble OF astronomical
terms, :occult' gibberish and modern
Stock Exchange slang, and I defy any
human being to tell what he was driving
at. That was probably the thing that
made it impressive: = - 49,: =
- II tried to point out the gross absurd
ity of the whole proposition,'' continued
the broker. ":"This fakir,' said l., lis
talking about planets that: are thousands
Of shines larger than, this little earth. Of
ours.z They are billions upon billions. Of
miles away and rush through space in
nr nf ~
human mind can never begin to conceive
their grandeur and their immensely. and
ail we know is that they have been fos
lowing out some great universal law since
the beginning of time; yet here is little
>tuppeny na'penny confidence man: in
Boston who. asks you to believe that this
stupendous procession Of worlds is set in
motion to govern the manipulations Of a
handful of paltry stockholders in Liver
pool and New Orleans! It's the craziest
and most comical idea ever broached out
side Of an asylum The. old gentleman
right powerful lot of times he replied.
- Il gave, him up as a hopeless case, but
the incident caused me- to look into the
matter, and upon a little inquiry I found
IS or 20 SPECTATORS here in the city VIII.
the advice of. Zobaria and other profess
sional astrol9gers of the same stamp
OF course thuy represented a mere frac.
ton of the total humber of Vocal clients
The fakirs sent ONT tips on cotton. sugar
letters Beginning in about the same way
For exa1np1e, I find1Mars in the ascend
ant, indicating impending change; IRA
nd 1urf wi ,,Jo ;,,l
eating rising market: Sirius conjons left
: wing of last Horoscope, and so on and. so
on. 1t is hard to believe e!iat some ped.
pie can possibly swallow sch a palpahle
F.; fraud. butt found to MY surprise that a
good many OF the dupes were men and
women ldt superior teducation and, %ap
! parently, more titan, average intelligence
"'Lhter on l. had q clerk in my office
who had ffor1herly worked for an astrolo-
gera6f some note in New York a;ty;;salld
he told ME many amusing things about
the business behind the scenes. His
years had managed a big tent showe in
the west for IA liver regulator company.
He haT*piclscdsup a smattering of scien-
tifc terms in the role !of long haired doe
tor, and; being nat t1rally d sma TT, <brisht
called it, and launched out for himself
He got the FORMS for horoscopes from
All old English almanac or 'ephemera,
and as business increased he had four
or five girls griaiding them out all the
time. My young man told me that his
mail was enormous and that most of his
dupes were residents of small towns in
the south and west. The ex-medicine
man. was shre,rd enough never to accept
any money for investment himself, but
) confined his operations strictly to giving
advice, for which he charged 50 letter.
The market tips were prepared for the
concern by picturesque dipsomaniac
who used to be "a, pr6mineuti figure on
change, but had gone to the dogs and
: was glad to pick up an odd dollar wher.
ever he could Being aR expert. bis opin-
ions had some real value and he fire.
quently hit it right. That was the gang
who read it in the stars This is a
queer age we are .livihE in.p1-New Or.
leans Times: pemocrat}|| II
:. Scotch All Through.
A private in. Scottish regiment was
ahof in;{ ho, xh;~1, thu h,,iln< ~