Gardens of the Crystal Palace

Furthermore. And more on subject of Stichomancy, AKA "Bingomancy"

To produce a reading I decided to try a Random Word Generator I started with a "common" word which produced "Daylight" and then a "somewhat uncommon" word. Which was Prolixity.

The word "Daylight" originally brought me to "Between the dark and the daylight: romances By William Dean Howells". Although curious, not of much interest.

So, I then went to The Voyage to the North Pole By "Daylight" printed in 1878
Also, a curious account, but I realised my "random" reading was becoming less & less. A few Avatarlike passages caught my eyes..



As to prolixity, Shakespere apparently liked the term, and used it often. But, "The principles of rhetoric" which is a "scarce antiquarian book included in the special Legacy Reprint Series."

Houdini Stichomancy

Stichomancy is said to be one of the oldest forms of divination in which the querant opens to a random page of randomly selected book in a library, to find an excerpt that applies to the situation at hand. I like to do my "readings" on http://www.facade.com

My one passage reading today is drawn from a book by Harry Houdini. Apparently, Harry did write a few. Someday, I'll figure out generate a code for doing a "Googlemancy" or "Bingomancy", perhaps with the book snippet feature.



Here is a random passage..

..."Then, all at once, when the force exerted horizontally is as great as possible, and the men are exerting their strength in the opposite direction in order to resist it, the girl abruptly ceases the pressure WITHOUT WARNING and exerts it in the OPPOSITE DIRECTION. Unprepared for this change, the victims lose their equilibrium and find themselves at the mercy of the girl, and so much the more so in proportion as they are stronger and their.."

Nice.