The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1903-04-22
A REPORTERS
EXPERIENCE

A few nights ago the Advertiser ser
one Of its reporters to see the fortune
tellers and this is what he write
about it:
"WelIah-you have been living for
long time past under cloud"
Now, it will be admitted that tina
was a most discouraging beginning, t.
be made by a fortune-teller. You see
man does not go to fortune-teller Il
have chunks of cold, hard fact thrown
at him. And. If he does. he generally
misses it. But that fortune-teiler didn't
have any other guess coming. 1t shows
that even fortune-teners are human
when he went bullying right ahead and
took another chance.
1t began in this way: Says the man.
aging editor. whose say goes: There's
a couple of haole kahunas up on Bere-
tania street, came down on the last
Alameda, and you go up there and have
your fortune told" That was the seal
ed order, and the reporter went. 1t was
easy enough to find the kahunas. They
had a tin sign on the gate, as large
as life. and a little incandescent bulb
so that you could not miss the place. if
you preferred to see your 'spooks and
to look into the future in the dark. The
kahunas-they call them spirit-me-
diums in the old United States, but this
is a new dispensation-were at home.
too. They always are at home. That
is a part of their graft. "Arnold-Dick-
son Brothers," the sign read, and a
bilious looking little man with a pimply
face who came to the door was one of
the hyphenated brothers. likely. for he
said, at once, on seeing a visitor:
You want a reading?"
He said it with such an air of assur-
ance that the visitor would have be-
lieved he wanted it. anyhow. whether
he really had wanted It or not, and so
he meekly assented. Well said the
pimply- bilious man. I'VE have two
kinds. The ordinary one is a dollar,
but you can have a bigger and more
complete one for two dollars" A man
does not buy the future wholesale, at
least not unless he is in Wall street or
the grain pit, and the visitor thought
a dollars worth would do. The pimply-
bilious man looked a trif1e disappointed.
about dollars worth. say, but he bore
it,
All right" he said. You just wait.
The medium will be disengaged in a
The disengaging of the medium was a
tedious process, apparently, and one re-
curing a lot OF subdued hammering
and some whispered consultation and
the moving about of tables and chairs
in a stealthy kind of a way. but they
broke him loose after awhile, for the
pimply-bilious man came back and
walked the visitor into an inner room
and seated him at table, with pad
and a hard pencil before him
Now. you write five or six questions
IN that paper" he said. and just hold |
he paper in your hand"
Then he went out, coming in again
when a little handbeH was touched.
md handing the visitor a dozen or two
;o-called spirit pictures to look at-the
zind YOU can make by taking two shots !
N one film with your kodak. Il made 4
hose myself" said the pimply-bilious |
nan in a sad kind OF way, as though 1
le were ashamed OF it. And. indeed |
,e had reason to be. They were vile
Then he took the pad and went out Of ]
he room That pad was most impor- b
ant thing. You see. When you write on /
he top sheet of pad Of paper. with d.
lard pencil, many things are likely to