Today's Stichomancy for Italo Calvino

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Padre Ignacio by Owen Wister:

"Ah, my Felipe," he exclaimed, "what could you and I not do if we had a better organ! Only a little better! See! above this row of keys would be a second row, and many more stops. Then we would make such music as has never yet been heard in California. But my people are so poor and so few! And some day I shall have passed from them, and it will be too late."

"Perhaps," ventured Felipe, "the Americanos--"

"They care nothing for us, Felipe. They are not of our religion--or of any religion, from what I can hear. Don't forget my Dixit Dominus."

The Padre retired once more to the sacristy, while the horse that brought Temptation came over the hill.

The hour of service drew near; and as the Padre waited he once again

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Rivers to the Sea by Sara Teasdale:

Sure and elated.

That was the gift you gave me. . . .

The streets grew still more tangled, And led at last to water black and glossy, Flecked here and there with lights, faint and far off. There on a shabby building was a sign "The India Wharf " . . . and we turned back.

I always felt we could have taken ship And crossed the bright green seas To dreaming cities set on sacred streams And palaces

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

grandchildren. The portion coming to Baruch amounted to only twenty thousand francs.

"Now you are rich," said the old man, "take your money, and go. I remain master of my own property and that of Madame Hochon, who in this matter shares all my intentions, and I shall give it to whom I choose; namely, our dear Adolphine. Yes, we can marry her if we please to the son of a peer of France, for she will be an heiress."

"A noble fortune!" said Monsieur Heron.

"Monsieur Maxence Gilet will make up this loss to you," said Madame Hochon.

"Let my hard-saved money go to a scapegrace like you? no, indeed!"

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 Boys' Life of Abraham Lincoln by Helen Nicolay:

to be hunted for in summer and nuts in autumn; while all the year round birds and small animals pattered across his path to people the solitude in place of human companions. The boy had few comrades. He wandered about playing his lonesome little games, and when these were finished returned to the small and cheerless cabin. Once, when asked what he remembered about the War of 1812 with Great Britain, he replied: "Only this: I had been fishing one day and had caught a little fish, which I was taking home. I met a soldier in the road, and having always been told at home that we must be good to soldiers, I gave him my fish." It is only a glimpse into his life, but it shows the solitary, generous