| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: San Francisco; and at that his knees were loosened, and the fumes
of the wine departed from his head like mists off a river in the
morning. And then he had another thought; and it was a strange
one, that made his cheeks to burn.
"I must make sure of this," thought he.
So he closed the door, and went softly round the corner again, and
then came noisily in, as though he were but now returned. And, lo!
by the time he opened the front door no bottle was to be seen; and
Kokua sat in a chair and started up like one awakened out of sleep.
"I have been drinking all day and making merry," said Keawe. "I
have been with good companions, and now I only come back for money,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: steep banks, which ran into a little wood of thirty acres recently
purchased. When the chateau had its full complement of inhabitants
they all preferred to take this covered way through the breach to the
main road which skirted the park walls and led to the farm, rather
than go round by the entrance. By dint of thus using it the breach in
the sides of the moat had gradually been widened on both sides, with
all the less scruple because in this nineteenth century of ours moats
are no longer of the slightest use, and Laurence's guardian had often
talked of putting this one to some other purpose. The constant
crumbling away of the earth and stones and gravel had ended by filling
up the ditch, so that only after heavy rains was the causeway thus
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