Today's Stichomancy for David Bowie

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

delivery."

"But--a--but on that morning I shall be rather particularly engaged." His tones sank almost away on these words.

"We should prefer to wait, then. You will leave your address. In half-pound boxes, I suppose?"

"Boxes? Oh, yes--I hadn't thought--no--just a big, round one. Like this, you know!" His arms embraced a circular space of air. "With plenty of icing."

I do not think that there was any smile on the other side of the counter; there was, at any rate, no hint of one in the voice. "And how many pounds?"

He was again staggered. "Why--a--I never ordered one before. I want

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Vendetta by Honore de Balzac:

it can be compared only to that of a miser discovering Aladdin's treasure. Then she sprang down hastily and returned to her place, changed the position of her picture, pretended to be still dissatisfied with the light, pushed a table close to the partition, on which she placed a chair, climbed lightly to the summit of this erection, and again looked through the crevice. She cast but one glance into the space beyond, which was lighted through a skylight; but what she saw produced so strong an effect upon her that she tottered.

"Take care, Mademoiselle Ginevra, you'll fall!" cried Laure.

All the young girls gazed at the imprudent climber, and the fear of

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Tapestried Chamber by Walter Scott:

which they may be modified or surmounted, I have, nevertheless, ventured to draw up the following traditional narrative as a story in which, when the general details are known, the interest is so much concentrated in one strong moment of agonizing passion, that it can be understood and sympathized with at a single glance. I therefore presume that it may be acceptable as a hint to some one among the numerous artists who have of late years distinguished themselves as rearing up and supporting the British school.

Enough has been said and sung about

"The well-contested ground,

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 Glaucus/The Wonders of the Shore by Charles Kingsley:

two former. In it, each point, instead of degenerating into a knot, as in tuberculatum, or developing from delicate flat briar- prickles into long straight thorns, as in aculeatum, is close-set to its fellow, and curved at the point transversely to the shell, the whole being thus horrid with hundreds of strong tenterhooks, making his castle impregnable to the raveners of the deep. For we can hardly doubt that these prickles are meant as weapons of defence, without which so savoury a morsel as the mollusc within (cooked and eaten largely on some parts of our south coast) would be a staple article of food for sea-beasts of prey. And it is noteworthy, first, that the defensive thorns which are permanent on