Today's Stichomancy for Ulysses S. Grant

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac:

precise moment when God sent him a good idea to communicate to her. The cardinal asked which was the most precious thing to a lady; the first or the last kiss? To which La Beaupertuys replied: "that it was the last, seeing that she knew then what she was losing, while at the first she did not know what she would gain." During these sayings, and others which have most unfortunately been lost, came the six thousand gold crowns, which were worth all three hundred thousand francs of to-day, so much do we go on decreasing in value every day. The king ordered the crowns to be arranged upon a table, and well lighted up, so that they shone like the eyes of the company which lit up involuntarily, and made them laugh in spite of themselves. They did

Droll Stories, V. 1

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Red Seal by Natalie Sumner Lincoln:

instant, then answered his own question. "Because Miss McIntyre did not agree with Rochester that Turnbull had died from angina pectoris - that is obvious, too. Now, what made her think that?"

"I am sure I don't know" - Kent's air of candor was unmistakable and Ferguson showed his disappointment.

"Hasn't Miss McIntyre been to see you?"

"No," was Kent's truthful answer; Barbara was the younger twin and her sister was therefore, "Miss McIntyre."

"You must recollect, Ferguson," he added, "that had Miss McIntyre called to see me about poor Turnbull, I would not have discussed the interview with any one, under any conditions."

The Red Seal

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy:

intended by Nature to be left intact. But I couldn't leave you alone!"

"No, no, Jude!" she said quickly. "Don't reproach yourself with being what you are not. If anybody is to blame it is I."

"I supported you in your resolve to leave Phillotson; and without me perhaps you wouldn't have urged him to let you go."

"I should have, just the same. As to ourselves, the fact of our not having entered into a legal contract is the saving feature in our union. We have thereby avoided insulting, as it were, the solemnity of our first marriages."

Jude the Obscure

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 Sanitary and Social Lectures by Charles Kingsley:

Science?--facts which ought to, and ultimately will, disturb the vested interests of thousands, will put them to inconvenience, possibly at first to great expense; and yet facts which you can neither see nor handle, but must accept and pay hundreds of thousands of pounds for, on the mere word of a doctor or inspector who gets his living thereby. Poor John Bull! To expect that you would accept such a gospel cheerfully was indeed to expect too much!

But yet, though the public opinion of the mass could not be depended on, there was a body left, distinct from the mass, and priding itself so much on that distinctness that it was ready to