Today's Stichomancy for Richard Burton

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Chance by Joseph Conrad:

"The steward found him," Mr. Powell roused himself. "He went in there with a cup of tea at five and of course dropped it. I was on watch again. He reeled up to me on deck pale as death. I had been expecting it; and yet I could hardly speak. "Go and tell the captain quietly," I managed to say. He ran off muttering "My God! My God!" and I'm hanged if he didn't get hysterical while trying to tell the captain, and start screaming in the saloon, "Fully dressed! Dead! Fully dressed!" Mrs. Anthony ran out of course but she didn't get hysterical. Franklin, who was there too, told me that she hid her face on the captain's breast and then he went out and left them there. It was days before Mrs. Anthony was seen on deck.

Chance

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Cromwell by William Shakespeare:

[Enter Bedford like the Clown, and Hodge in his cloak and his Hat.]

BEDFORD. How doost thou like us, Cromwell? is it well?

CROMWELL. O, my Lord, excellent: Hodge, how doost feel thy self?

HODGE. How do I feel my self? why, as a Noble man should do. O, how I feel honor come creeping on! My Nobility is wonderful melancholy: Is it not most Gentlemen like to be melancholy?

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Flame and Shadow by Sara Teasdale:

but "Helen of Troy" (1911) was the true launch of her career, followed by "Rivers to the Sea" (1915), "Love Songs" (1917), "Flame and Shadow" (1920) and more. Her final volume, "Strange Victory", is considered by many to be predictive of her suicide in 1933.

----

From an anthology of verse by Jessie B. Rittenhouse (1913, 1917):

"Teasdale, Sara (Mrs. Ernst B. Filsinger). Born in St. Louis, Missouri, August 10, 1884. Educated at private schools. She is the author of "Sonnets to Duse", 1907; "Helen of Troy, and Other Poems", 1911; "Rivers to the Sea", 1915; "Love Songs", 1917. Editor of "The Answering Voice: A Hundred Love Lyrics by Women", 1917.

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 Bride of Lammermoor by Walter Scott:

moment while looking at your sketch. Only generally, from the languishing look of the young lady, and the care you have taken to present a very handsome leg on the part of the gentleman, I presume there is some reference to a love affair between them."

"Do you really presume to form such a bold conjecture?" said Tinto. "And the indignant earnestness with which you see the man urge his suit, the unresisting and passive despair of the younger female, the stern air of inflexible determination in the elder woman, whose looks express at once consciousness that she is acting wrong and a firm determination to persist in the course she has adopted----"

The Bride of Lammermoor