Today's Stichomancy for George Armstrong Custer

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Travels and Researches in South Africa by Dr. David Livingstone:

formerly alight@mercury.interpath.net). To assure a high quality text, the original was typed in (manually) twice and electronically compared. [Note on text: Italicized words or phrases are CAPITALIZED. Some obvious errors have been corrected.]

Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa. Also called, Travels and Researches in South Africa; or, Journeys and Researches in South Africa. By David Livingstone [British (Scot) Missionary and Explorer--1813-1873.]

David Livingstone was born in Scotland, received his medical degree from the University of Glasgow, and was sent to South Africa by the London Missionary Society. Circumstances led him to try to meet

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Chinese Boy and Girl by Isaac Taylor Headland:

Others slept upon globular pillows that when they became so restless as to move and cause the pillow to roll from under their head they might get up and study. The child once more took the blocks and illustrated how one who was so poor as to be unable to furnish himself with candles, confined a fire-fly in a gauze lantern using that instead of a lamp. At the same time he explained that another who was perhaps not able to afford the gauze lantern, studied by the light of a glowworm.

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Shakespeare's Sonnets by William Shakespeare:

How many a holy and obsequious tear Hath dear religious love stol'n from mine eye, As interest of the dead, which now appear But things remov'd that hidden in thee lie! Thou art the grave where buried love doth live, Hung with the trophies of my lovers gone, Who all their parts of me to thee did give, That due of many now is thine alone: Their images I lov'd, I view in thee, And thou--all they--hast all the all of me.

XXXII

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 Lemorne Versus Huell by Elizabeth Drew Stoddard:

Brothers, went to Europe with his family, and I went to Waterbury, accompanied by Mr. Uxbridge. He consulted mother in regard to our marriage, and appointed it in November. In October Aunt Eliza sent for me to come back to Bond Street and spend a week. She had some fine marking to do, she wrote. While there I noticed a restlessness in her which I had never before observed, and conferred with Mrs. Roll on the matter. "She do be awake nights a deal, and that's the reason," Mrs. Roll said. Her manner was the same in other respects. She said she would not give me any thing for my wedding outfit, but she paid my fare from Waterbury and back.

She could not spare me to go out, she told Mr. Uxbridge, and in