| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Chinese Boy and Girl by Isaac Taylor Headland: from the street a showman with a number of trained mice. He had
erected a little scaffolding just inside the gateway, at one side
of which there was a small rope ladder, and this with the
inevitable gong, and the small boxes in which the mice were kept
constituted his entire outfit.
In the boxes he had what seemed to be cotton from the milk-weed
which furnished a nest for the mice. These he took from their
little boxes one by one, stroked them tenderly, while he
explained what this particular mouse would do, put each one on
the rope ladder, which they ascended, and performed the tricks
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart: behind her, I could almost touch the soft hair behind her ear.
"I have no intention of pressing any charge against you," I said
with forced civility, for my hands were itching to get at him, "if
you will give us a clear account of what happened on the Ontario
that night."
Sullivan raised his handsome, haggard head and looked around at me.
"I've seen you before, haven't I?" he asked. "Weren't you an
uninvited guest at the Laurels a few days - or nights - ago? The
cat, you remember, and the rug that slipped?"
"I remember," I said shortly. He glanced from me to Alison and
quickly away.
The Man in Lower Ten |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman by Mary Wollstonecraft: and will not allow great part of love in the female, as well as
male breast, to spring in some respects involuntarily, may not
admit that charms are as necessary to feed the passion, as virtues
to convert the mellowing spirit into friendship. To such observers
I have nothing to say, any more than to the moralists, who insist
that women ought to, and can love their husbands, because it is
their duty. To you, my child, I may add, with a heart tremblingly
alive to your future conduct, some observations, dictated by my
present feelings, on calmly reviewing this period of my life. When
novelists or moralists praise as a virtue, a woman's coldness of
constitution, and want of passion; and make her yield to the ardour
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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 Cruise of the Jasper B. by Don Marquis: irons were so intent upon their own troubles, and the pursuer was
so keen on vengeance, that none of them noticed the vessel. As
they limped along, splashing through the pools the rain had left,
the pursuer would occasionally pause to fling stones and sticks
and even cakes of mud at the fugitives, who were whimpering as
they tottered forward.
The man in the baby blue pajamas was cursing in a high-pitched,
nasal, querulous voice. Cleggett noticed with astonishment that
a single-barreled eyeglass was screwed into one of his eyes.
Occasionally it dropped to the ground, and he would stop and
fumble for it and wipe it on his wet sleeve and replace it. Had
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