preying on the small fry which pass unheeded through the meshes of
the old man's net. Just as there is no medical diploma necessary for a
doctor in China, so any man may be a fortune-teller who likes to start
business in that particular line. The ranks are recruited generally
from unsuccessful candidates at the public examinations; but all that
is really necessary is the minimum of education, some months' study of
the art, and a good memory. For there really are certain principles
which guide every member of the fraternity. These are derived from
books written on the subject, and are absolutely essential to success,
or nativities cast in two different streets would be so unlike as to
expose the whole system at once. The method is this. A customer takes
his seat in front of the table and consults the wooden tablet on which
is engraved a scale of charges as follows:--

Foretelling any single event . . . . . . . . 8 cash
Foretelling any single event with joss-stick, 16 cash
Telling a fortune . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28 cash
Telling a fortune in detail . . . . . . . . . 50 cash
Telling a fortune by reading the stars . . . 50 cash
Fixing the marriage day . . . . . . . According to agreement

In case he merely wants an answer on a given subject, he puts his
question and receives the reply at once on a slip of paper. But if he
desires to have his fortune told, he dictates the year, month, day,
and hour of his birth, which are written down by the sage in the
particular characters used by the Chinese to express times and
seasons. From the combinations of these and a careful estimate of the
proportions in which the five elements--gold, wood, water, fire, and
earth--make their appearance, certain results are deduced upon which
details may be grafted according to the fancy of the fortune-teller.
The same combinations of figures, i.e., characters, will always give
the same resultant in the hands of any one who has learned the first
principles of his art; it is only in the reading, the explanation
thereof, that any material difference can be detected between the
reckonings of any two of these philosophers, which amounts to saying
that whoever makes the greatest number of happy hits beyond the mere
technicalities common to all, is esteemed the wisest prophet and will
drive the most flourishing trade.

Fully believing in the Chinese household word which says "Ignorance of
any one thing is always one point to the ba