Now! Then! A Scarborough policeman’s wife shows her palm to one Madame Morlee and receives some unwelcome news about one of her children

7 September 1905: A Scarborough policeman’s wife shows her palm to one Madame Morlee and receives some unwelcome news about one of her children

Daily Express. 1905/09/08. Backward “Prophecy.” Old News Leads to the Police Court. London. Get it:

Excerpt

In the police court yesterday the policeman’s wife said that “Madame Morlee” took her hand, which was gloved, and told her that she had a boy and a girl. Her husband, continued Madame Morlee, was under government service, and would change his occupation at 32 years of age and go into the “eating line.” Mrs Philpott, the visitor, said that she had two children, who were girls, and that her husband was 35 years of age. Madame Morlee’s defence was that she did not profess to foretell the future, nor did she practise palmistry. She merely gave advice, and in the course of conversation told her visitor that she had two children, one of the girls having the temperament of a boy, and that if it was not a boy it ought to have been. As a matter of fact, the visitor’s husband was an army cook, 32 years old. Madame Morlee was fined seven guineas.

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To facilitate reading, the spelling and punctuation of elderly excerpts have generally been modernised, and distracting excision scars concealed. My selections, translations, and editions are copyright.
Abbreviations:

ER: East Riding
GM: Greater Manchester
NR: North Riding
NY: North Yorkshire
SY: South Yorkshire
WR: West Riding
WY: West Yorkshire

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Original

Backward “Prophecy.” Old News Leads to the Police Court.
A policeman’s wife at Scarborough called on a local practitioner in the “prophecy line” with the main object of obtaining evidence to warrant police court proceedings.
She received plenty of information for her money, but, as it happened, there was a “twist” about it which was not acceptable.
In the police court yesterday the policeman’s wife said that “Madame Morlee” took her hand, which was gloved, and told her that she had a boy and a girl.
Her husband, continued Madame Morlee, was under Government, and would change his occupation at thirty-two years of age, and go into the “eating line.” Mrs. PHilpott, the visitor, said that she had two children, who were girls, and that her husband was thirty-five years of age.
Madame Morlee’s defence was that she did not profess to foretell the future, nor did she practise palmistry.
She merely gave advice, and in the course of conversation told her visitor that she had two children, one of the girls having the temperament of a boy, and that if it was not a boy it ought to have been. As a matter of fact, the visitor’s husband was an Army cook, thirty-two years old.
Madame Morlee was fined seven guineas.

225 words.