Today's Stichomancy for Wassily Kandinsky

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

stoops to your ear and adds, with a shrewd glance: "I have never seen Monsieur Firmiani. His social position is that of looking after property in Italy. Madame Firmiani is a Frenchwoman, and spends her money like a Parisian. She has excellent tea. It is one of the few houses where you can amuse yourself; the refreshments are exquisite. It is very difficult to get admitted; therefore, of course, one meets only the best society in her salons." Here the Lounger takes a pinch of snuff; he inhales it slowly and seems to say: "I go there, but don't expect me to present YOU."

Evidently the Lounger considers that Madame Firmiani keeps a sort of inn, without a sign.

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lost Continent by Edgar Rice Burroughs:

The roaring of the beasts that had discovered us, together with the report of my rifle, had set the balance of the fierce inmates of the palace into the most frightful uproar I have ever heard.

I feared that it would not be long before intelligence or instinct would draw them from the interiors and set them upon our trail, the river. Nor had we much more than reached it when a lion bounded around the corner of the edifice we had just quitted and stood looking about as though in search of us.

Following, came others, while Victory and I crouched in

Lost Continent

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Damaged Goods by Upton Sinclair:

but the most learned physicians were sometimes deceived.

He remembered something he had read in one of the medical books. "Dr. Ricord maintains that after a certain period the disease is no longer contagious. He has proven his contentions by examples. Today you produce new examples to show that he is wrong! Now, I want to do what's right, but surely I have the right to think it over. And when I think it over, I realize that all the evils with which you threaten me are only probable evils. In spite of your desire to terrify me, you have been forced to admit that possibly my marriage would not have any troublesome consequence for my wife."

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 Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence:

she felt he was coming to share her burden.

"Is it bad?" asked Paul, as soon as she entered the house.

"It's bad enough," she replied.

"What?"

She sighed and sat down, undoing her bonnet-strings. Her son watched her face as it was lifted, and her small, work-hardened hands fingering at the bow under her chin.

"Well," she answered, "it's not really dangerous, but the nurse says it's a dreadful smash. You see, a great piece of rock fell on his leg--here--and it's a compound fracture. There are pieces of bone sticking through---"

Sons and Lovers