Today's Stichomancy for Pierce Brosnan

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Great Big Treasury of Beatrix Potter by Beatrix Potter:

flavor in proof of it--there was smoke coming out of the broken pail that served as a chimney.

Benjamin Bunny sat up, staring, his whiskers twitched. Inside the stick house somebody dropped a plate, and said something. Benjamin stamped his foot, and bolted.

He never stopped till he came to the other side of the wood. Apparently Tommy Brock had turned the

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Ten Years Later by Alexandre Dumas:

But when he placed his foot upon the worn stone steps, along which so many unhappy wretches had passed, when he felt himself impregnated, as it were, with the atmosphere of those gloomy dungeons, moistened with tears, there could be but little doubt he was overcome by his feelings, for his head was bowed and his eyes became dim, as he followed Baisemeaux without a syllable.

CHAPTER 100

The Second Floor of la Bertaudiere

On the second flight of stairs, whether from fatigue or emotion, the breathing of the visitor began to fail him, and

Ten Years Later

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

became indistinguishable from the faint blue horizon line. In a little while he felt that he was really alone, and lost in the wide ocean, lost and alone in the world and in life.

"There is no need to cry, lad; there is a God for us all," said an old sailor, with rough kindliness in his thick voice.

The boy thanked him with pride in his eyes. Then he bowed his head, and resigned himself to a sailor's life. He was a father.

ANGOULEME, August, 1832.

ADDENDUM

The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.

Brandon, Lady Marie Augusta

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 Lucile by Owen Meredith:

The dance and the play. I am now at the play.

ALFRED.

At the play, are you now? Then perchance I now may Presume, Duke, to ask you what, ever until Such a moment, I waited . . .

LUVOIS.

Oh! ask what you will. Franc jeu! on the table my cards I spread out. Ask!

ALFRED.

Duke, you were called to a meeting (no doubt