Today's Stichomancy for T. S. Eliot

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Land that Time Forgot by Edgar Rice Burroughs:

beast is so large, and its nervous organization of so low a caliber, that it took all this time for the intelligence of death to reach and be impressed upon the minute brain. The thing was dead when your bullets struck it; but it did not know it for several seconds--possibly a minute. If I am not mistaken, it is an Allosaurus of the Upper Jurassic, remains of which have been found in Central Wyoming, in the suburbs of New York."

An Irishman by the name of Brady grinned. I afterward learned that he had served three years on the traffic-squad of the Chicago police force.

I had been calling Nobs in the meantime and was about to set out

The Land that Time Forgot

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Othello by William Shakespeare:

Iag. Hold hoa: Lieutenant, Sir Montano, Gentlemen: Haue you forgot all place of sense and dutie? Hold. The Generall speaks to you: hold for shame

Oth. Why how now hoa? From whence ariseth this? Are we turn'd Turkes? and to our selues do that Which Heauen hath forbid the Ottamittes. For Christian shame, put by this barbarous Brawle: He that stirs next, to carue for his owne rage, Holds his soule light: He dies vpon his Motion. Silence that dreadfull Bell, it frights the Isle, From her propriety. What is the matter, Masters?

Othello

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Madam How and Lady Why by Charles Kingsley:

tops of many hills to the north of London; just remnants which the sea, and the Thames, and the rain have not eaten down. Probably they once stretched right out to sea, sloping slowly under the waves, where the mouth of the Thames is now. You know the sand- cliffs at Bournemouth?

Of course.

Then those are of the same age as the Bagshot sands, and lie on the London clay, and slope down off the New Forest into the sea, which eats them up, as you know, year by year and day by day. And here were once perhaps cliffs just like them, where London Bridge now stands.

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 Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer:

near Khotan, in Chinese Turkestan.

"They fired at the house and set it in flames. There were in the house about 100 Russians, many of whom were killed.

"The Russian Government has instructed its Minister at Peking to make the most vigorous representations on the subject."--Reuter.

Finally, in a Personal Column, I found the following:--

"HO-NAN. Have abandoned visit.--ELTHAM."

I had just pasted it into my book when Nayland Smith came in and threw himself into an arm-chair, facing me across the table. I showed him the cutting.

"I am glad, for Eltham's sake--and for the girl's," was his comment.

The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu