If you receive one of those love tokens, and cannot guess the party who
sent it, or are in any doubt, the following method will explain it to a
certainty: Prick the fourth finger of your left hand, and with a crow
quill write on the back of the valentine the day and hour in which you
were born, and the date of the year; also of the present one, the moon’s
age, and the name of the present morning star, all of which you will find
in the almanac, and the sign into which the sun has entered. Try this on
the first Friday after you receive the valentine, but do not go to bed
till midnight; place the paper in your left shoe, and put it under your
pillow, lie on your left side, and repeat three times:
St. Valentine, pray condescend
To be this night a maiden’s friend;
Let me now my lover see,
Be he of high or low degree;
By a sign his station show,
Be it weal or be it woe.
Let him come to my bedside,
And my fortune thus decide.
The young woman will be sure to dream of the identical person who sent the
valentine and be enabled to guess if he is to be her husband.