Today's Stichomancy for Madonna

The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Passionate Pilgrim by William Shakespeare:

As take the pain, but cannot pluck the pelf.

XV.

Lord, how mine eyes throw gazes to the east! My heart doth charge the watch; the morning rise Doth cite each moving sense from idle rest. Not daring trust the office of mine eyes, While Philomela sits and sings, I sit and mark, And wish her lays were tuned like the lark;

For she doth welcome daylight with her ditty, And drives away dark dismal-dreaming night: The night so pack'd, I post unto my pretty;

The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Plain Tales from the Hills by Rudyard Kipling:

to raise a two-thousand rupee loan on a five hundred pound insurance-policy, eighty pounds paid in premiums. He would recognize you, but you would have some trouble in recognizing him.

The Directors of the Bank--it had its headquarters in Calcutta and its General Manager's word carried weight with the Government-- picked their men well. They had tested Reggie up to a fairly severe breaking-strain. They trusted him just as much as Directors ever trust Managers. You must see for yourself whether their trust was misplaced.

Reggie's Branch was in a big Station, and worked with the usual staff--one Manager, one Accountant, both English, a Cashier, and a

The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Tom Sawyer, Detective by Mark Twain:

absent-minded and chuckle-headed and lovable--why, he was just an angel! What CAN be the matter of him, do you reckon?"

CHAPTER II. JAKE DUNLAP

WE had powerful good luck; because we got a chance in a stern-wheeler from away North which was bound for one of them bayous or one-horse rivers away down Louisiana way, and so we could go all the way down the Upper Mississippi and all the way down the Lower Mississippi to that farm in Arkansaw without having to change steamboats at St. Louis; not so very much short of a thousand miles at one pull.

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 Chessmen of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs:

beautiful, need have no fear. I, myself, will protect you if O-Tar so decrees. And as for your companion--but hold! You said 'companions'--there are others of your party then?"

"You see what you see," replied Tara haughtily.

"Be that as it may," said U-Dor. "If there be more they shall not escape Manator; but as I was saying, if your companion fights well he too may live, for O-Tar is just, and just are the laws of Manator. Come!"

Ghek demurred.

"It is useless," said the girl, seeing that he would have stood his ground and fought them. "Let us go with them. Why pit your

The Chessmen of Mars