Today's Stichomancy for Lee Harvey Oswald

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Child of Storm by H. Rider Haggard:

fear the witcheries of such a one as I; and because the Heavens made me beautiful with the beauty that men must follow, am I also to be killed as a sorceress?"

Now, to this argument neither Panda nor anyone else seemed to find an answer, especially as it was well known that Umbelazi had cherished his ambition to the succession long before he met Mameena. So that charge was dropped, and the first and greatest of the three proceeded with; namely, that it was she, Mameena, and not her husband, Masapo, who had murdered Nandie's child.

When this accusation was made against her, for the first time I saw a little shade of trouble flit across Mameena's soft eyes.

Child of Storm

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Complete Poems of Longfellow by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow:

Consult the dead upon things that were, But the living only on things that are. Have you done this, by the appliance And aid of doctors?

PRINCE HENRY. Ay, whole schools Of doctors, with their learned rules; But the case is quite beyond their science. Even the doctors of Salern Send me back word they can discern No cure for a malady like this,

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac:

dinner. And go to Madame de Beaujeu, and let her know that I wish to dine alone to-day. Do you know, madame," continued the king, pretending to be slightly angry, "that you neglect me? It is almost three years since I have seen you. Come, come here, my pretty," he added, sitting down and holding out his arms to her. "How thin you have grown! Why have you let her grow so thin?" said the king, roughly, addressing the Comte de Poitiers.

The jealous husband cast so frightened a look at his wife that she almost pitied him.

"Happiness, sire!" he stammered.

"Ah! you love each other too much,--is that it?" said the king,

The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from The Divine Comedy (translated by H.F. Cary) by Dante Alighieri:

The first verse of a eanzone or song in the Convito of Dante, which he again cites in his Treatise de Vulg. Eloq. 1. ii. c. vi.

CANTO III

v. 9. How doth a little failing wound thee sore.] (Ch'era al cor picciol fallo amaro morso. Tasso, G. L. c. x. st. 59.

v. 11. Haste, that mars all decency of act. Aristotle in his Physiog iii. reekons it among the "the signs of an impudent man," that he is "quick in his motions." Compare Sophoeles, Electra, 878.

The Divine Comedy (translated by H.F. Cary)