Today's Stichomancy for Robert E. Lee

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

daughter, whose excessive sensibility alarmed him; a passion, an assault, a shock of any kind might wound her mortally. Though she seldom deserved blame, a mere word of reproach overcame her; she kept it in the depths of her heart, where it fostered a meditative melancholy; she would turn away weeping, and wept long.

Thus the moral education of the young girl required no less care than her physical education. The old physician had been compelled to cease telling stories, such as all children love, to his daughter; the impressions she received were too vivid. Wise through long practice, he endeavored to develop her body in order to deaden the blows which a soul so powerful gave to it. Gabrielle was all of life and love to her

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Death of the Lion by Henry James:

sofa in his study. That pretext of indisposition had not in the least been meant as a snub to the envoy of THE TATLER - he had gone to lie down in very truth. He had felt a pang of his old pain, the result of the agitation wrought in him by this forcing open of a new period. His old programme, his old ideal even had to be changed. Say what one would, success was a complication and recognition had to be reciprocal. The monastic life, the pious illumination of the missal in the convent cell were things of the gathered past. It didn't engender despair, but at least it required adjustment. Before I left him on that occasion we had passed a bargain, my part of which was that I should make it my

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart:

of her mind she had meant to deliver, retired vanquished to her bedroom.

Late that night when Nina had finally forgiven him and had settled down for sleep, Leslie went downstairs for a cigar, to find Elizabeth sitting there alone, a book on her knee, face down, and her eyes wistful and with a question in them.

"Sitting and thinking, or just sitting?" he inquired.

"I was thinking."

"Air-castles, eh? Well, be sure you put the right man into them!" He felt more or less a fool for having said that, for it was extremely likely that Nina's family was feeling some doubt about

The Breaking Point

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 Vailima Letters by Robert Louis Stevenson:

little stilted and left-handed; the style of St. Ives; also, to some extent, the style of R. L. S. dictating. ST. IVES is unintellectual and except as an adventure novel, dull. But the adventures seem to me sound and pretty probable; and it is a love story. Speed his wings!

SUNDAY NIGHT.

DE COEUR UN PEU PLUS DISPOS, MONSIEUR ET CHER CONFRERE, JE ME REMETS A VOUS ECRIRE. ST. IVES is now in the 5th chapter copying; in the 14th chapter of the dictated draft. I do not believe I shall end by disliking it.

MONDAY.