CHERIO'S LANGUAGE OF THE HAND COMPLETE PRACTICAL WORK ON THE SCIENCES OF CHEIROGNOMY AND CHEIROMANCY, CONTAINING THE SYSTEM, RULES, AND EXPERIENCE OF CHEIRO (SIGNED COPY)

New York / London: F. Tennyson Neel, 1897.

Revised and Enlarged edition. Quarto (10 x 8 ins); pp xv, 162, + [8] advertisements. Photographic portrait frontispiece of "Cheiro" by Aimé Dupont, of New York, plus 54 numbered plates of palms, fingers, nails, and two other, unnumbered, plates. Drawings of the seven types by Theo Doré. Publisher's black cloth boards with white lettering and decorations to front and spine, ends of which are slightly rubbed and rolled. Tips of corners worn. Two previous owners's inscriptions to front pastedown, in addition to Author's inscription in flowing ink hand, "In all Sincerity yours "Cheiro" / London / 28th June 1902".
Front hinge cracked and starting to pull, endpapers drawn together by strip of tape, neatly executed. Titlepage working loose from the bottom of join with spine. Underscoring in red and blue crayon in places in the text plus occ. note in margin and amendment to text. Manuscript notes in pencil loosely inserted adjacent to the various plates to which they pertain. General light browing to text leaves, more pronounced to endpapers and prelims. An interesting copy, possibly previously owned by an amateur palmist or somebody studying the work of Cheiro. A pivotal figure in the modern palmistry movement, Cheiro hailed from Rathdown, outside Dublin, Ireland. After studying under gurus in India, he set up a palmistry practice in London and enjoyed a wide following of famous clients, including celebrities like Mark Twain, Sarah Bernhardt, Mata Hari, Oscar Wilde, Grover Cleveland, Thomas Edison, the Prince of Wales, General Kitchener, William Ewart Gladstone, and Joseph Chamberlain. Such was Cheiro's popularity as a society palmist even those who were not believers in the occult had their hands read by him. The sceptical Mark Twain wrote in Cheiro's visitor's book that he had "exposed my character to me with humiliating accuracy". After some years in London and spent travelling the world, Cheiro moved to America. He spent his final years in Hollywood, seeing as many as twenty clients a day and doing some screenwriting before his death there in 1936 following a heart attack.