Today's Stichomancy for Pablo Picasso

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell:

each is less personal than the one before. We stand at the nearer end of the scale, the Far Orientals at the other. If with us the I seems to be of the very essence of the soul, then the soul of the Far East may be said to be Impersonality.

Curious as this characteristic is as a fact, it is even more interesting as a factor. For what it betokens of these peoples in particular may suggest much about man generally. It may mark a stride in theory, if a standstill in practice. Possibly it may help us to some understanding of ourselves. Not that it promises much aid to vexed metaphysical questions, but as a study in sociology it may not prove so vain.

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Charmides and Other Poems by Oscar Wilde:

Their cool black noses on my lowest boughs, And on my topmost branch the blackbird made A little nest of grasses for his spouse, And now and then a twittering wren would light On a thin twig which hardly bare the weight of such delight.

I was the Attic shepherd's trysting place, Beneath my shadow Amaryllis lay, And round my trunk would laughing Daphnis chase The timorous girl, till tired out with play She felt his hot breath stir her tangled hair, And turned, and looked, and fled no more from such delightful

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Second Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling:

"But the bone is yet to he cracked," said Mowgli. "Eowawa! THUS do we do in the Jungle!" The red blade ran like a flame along the side of a dhole whose hind-quarters were hidden by the weight of a clinging wolf.

"My kill!" snorted the wolf through his wrinkled nostrils. "Leave him to me."

"Is thy stomach still empty, Outlier?" said Mowgli. Won-tolla was fearfully punished, but his grip had paralysed the dhole, who could not turn round and reach him.

"By the Bull that bought me," said Mowgli, with a bitter laugh, "it is the tailless one!" And indeed it was the big bay-

The Second Jungle Book

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 Bab:A Sub-Deb, Mary Roberts Rinehart by Mary Roberts Rinehart:

"He tolarates her," I said, with a shrug.

More silense. I rang for Hannah to bring some ice water. We were in my BOUDOIR.

"I saw him yesterday," said Jane, when Hannah had gone.

"Jane!"

"In the park. He was with the woman that plays the Adventuress. Ugly old thing."

I drew a long breath of relief. For I knew that the Adventuress was at least thirty and perhaps more. Besides being both wicked and cruel, and not at all femanine.

Hannah brought the ice-water and then came in the most madening way