First published in 1915, "Fortune-Telling by Cards" is a short book by Professor P. R. S. Foli on telling fortunes, primarily with a standard deck of playing cards.
There is a short two-chapter section at the end about the Tarot. Described are several different spreads, including the 32-card method, the French and Italian methods, the Grand Star, and Etteilla's Tarot spread. This book is important for the understanding of the Tarot and Tarot spreads, in particular the Opening of the Key Spread used by The Golden Dawn. In this short book discussion of the card counting and pairing techniques used in the Opening of the Key spread are found in playing cards. The terse definitions of the cards and the use of relationships between the cards is also similar to the OOTK methods.
Sir Cyril Arthur Pearson was a British newspaper magnate and publisher, most noted for founding the Daily Express. He was also active as a writer, and wrote a number of tourist guides to locations in Britain and Europe. Under the pseudonym of "Professor P. R. S. Foli", he wrote Handwriting as an Index to Character in 1902, as well as works on fortune-telling and dream interpretation.
