Today's Stichomancy for Natalie Imbruglia

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Amy Foster by Joseph Conrad:

Swaffer's best ear. She showed no surprise, and only remarked grimly, in a veiled blank voice, 'He certainly won't get any other girl to marry him.'

"It is Miss Swaffer who has all the credit of the munificence: but in a very few days it came out that Mr. Swaffer had presented Yanko with a cot- tage (the cottage you've seen this morning) and something like an acre of ground--had made it over to him in absolute property. Willcox expe- dited the deed, and I remember him telling me he had a great pleasure in making it ready. It re-

Amy Foster

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan:

SURFACE. 'Sdeath--here's Sir Oliver at the Door----Now I beg-- Mr. Stanley----

CHARLES. Aye aye and I beg Mr. Premium----

SIR OLIVER. Gentlemen----

SURFACE. Sir, by Heaven you shall go--

CHARLES. Aye out with him certainly----

SIR OLIVER. This violence----

SURFACE. 'Tis your own Fault.

CHARLES. Out with him to be sure. [Both forcing SIR OLIVER out.]

Enter SIR PETER TEAZLE, LADY TEAZLE, MARIA, and ROWLEY

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Moby Dick by Herman Melville:

which, close to our gunwale, seemed calmly cooling himself with his own fan-like extremity.

All whaleboats carry certain curious contrivances, originally invented by the Nantucket Indians, called druggs. Two thick squares of wood of equal size are stoutly clenched together, so that they cross each other's grain at right angles; a line of considerable length is then attached to the middle of this block, and the other end of the line being looped, it can in a moment be fastened to a harpoon. It is chiefly among gallied whales that this drugg is used. For then, more whales are close round you than you can possibly chase at one time. But sperm whales are not every day encountered;

Moby Dick

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 Turn of the Screw by Henry James:

Yet if I had not indulged, to prove there was nothing in it, in this review, I should have missed the two or three dim elements of comfort that still remained to me. I should not for instance have been able to asseverate to my friend that I was certain--which was so much to the good--that _I_ at least had not betrayed myself. I should not have been prompted, by stress of need, by desperation of mind--I scarce know what to call it--to invoke such further aid to intelligence as might spring from pushing my colleague fairly to the wall. She had told me, bit by bit, under pressure, a great deal; but a small shifty spot on the wrong side of it all still sometimes brushed my brow like the wing of a bat;