Today's Stichomancy for Tom Leykis

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain:

he always does -- ask first one and then t'other, and when he comes to the right girl he'll know it, without any telling. Girls' faces always tell on them. They ain't got any backbone. She'll get licked. Well, it's a kind of a tight place for Becky Thatcher, because there ain't any way out of it." Tom conned the thing a moment longer, and then added: "All right, though; she'd like to see me in just such a fix -- let her sweat it out!"

Tom joined the mob of skylarking scholars outside. In a few moments the master arrived and school "took

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry:

XIV

THE ETHICS OF PIG

On an east-bound train I went into the smoker and found Jefferson Peters, the only man with a brain west of the Wabash River who can use his cerebrum cerebellum, and medulla oblongata at the same time.

Jeff is in the line of unillegal graft. He is not to be dreaded by widows and orphans; he is a reducer of surplusage. His favorite disguise is that of the target-bird at which the spendthrift or the reckless investor may shy a few inconsequential dollars. He is readily vocalized by tobacco; so, with the aid of two thick and easy-burning brevas, I got the story of his latest Autolycan adventure.

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley:

Tigers, who slay with cannon and sharp steel, Instead of teeth and claws:- all these we are. Are we no more than these, save in degree? Mere fools of nature, puppets of strong lusts, Taking the sword, to perish by the sword Upon the universal battle-field, Even as the things upon the moor outside?

The heath eats up green grass and delicate herbs; The pines eat up the heath; the grub the pine; The finch the grub; the hawk the silly finch; And man, the mightiest of all beasts of prey,

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 Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce:

"By these we swear he shall forsake His ways, nor cause our hearts to ache By sins of rope and torch and stake.

"We'll tie his red right hand until He'll have small freedom to fulfil The mandates of his lawless will."

So, in convention then and there, They named him Sheriff. The affair Was opened, it is said, with prayer.

J. Milton Sloluck

SIREN, n. One of several musical prodigies famous for a vain attempt

The Devil's Dictionary