| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: notice whatever of the flurry.
"I had a valuable cargo of general merchandise from the London
docks to Fort Churchill, a station of the old company on Hudson's
Bay," said the captain earnestly. "We were delayed in lading, and
baffled by head winds and a heavy tumbling sea all the way north-
about and across. Then the fog kept us off the coast; and when I
made port at last, it was too late to delay in those northern
waters with such a vessel and such a crew as I had. They cared for
nothing, and idled me into a fit of sickness; but my first mate was
a good, excellent man, with no more idea of being frozen in there
until spring than I had, so we made what speed we could to get
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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 Sportsman by Xenophon: [30] Or, "in their terror not of dogs only, but of eagles, since up to
a year old they are liable to be seized by these birds of prey
while crossing some bottom or bare ground, while if bigger . . ."
[31] {oi . . . planetai}, see Ael. op. cit. xiii. 14.
Whilst being hunted they are most visible in crossing ground that has
been turned up by the plough, if, that is, they have any trace of red
about them, or through stubble, owing to reflection. So, too, they are
visible enough on beaten paths or roads, presuming these are fairly
level, since the bright hue of their coats lights up by contrast. On
the other hand, they are not noticeable when they seek the cover of
rocks, hills, screes, or scrub, owing to similarity of colour. Getting
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Secrets of the Princesse de Cadignan by Honore de Balzac: be in the princess's antechamber to announce a visitor, if, by chance,
she happened to receive one.
When one thinks of what the beautiful Duchesse de Maufrigneuse had
been under the Restoration,--one of the queens of Paris, a dazzling
queen, whose luxurious existence equalled that of the richest women of
fashion in London,--there was something touching in the sight of her
in that humble little abode in the rue de Miromesnil, a few steps away
from her splendid mansion, which no amount of fortune had enabled her
to keep, and which the hammer of speculators has since demolished. The
woman who thought she was scarcely well served by thirty servants, who
possessed the most beautiful reception-rooms in all Paris, and the
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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 Alcibiades I by Plato: the state give it also to the individual, so as to make him consistent with
himself and with another?
ALCIBIADES: I should suppose so.
SOCRATES: But what is the nature of the agreement?--answer, and faint not.
ALCIBIADES: I mean to say that there should be such friendship and
agreement as exists between an affectionate father and mother and their
son, or between brothers, or between husband and wife.
SOCRATES: But can a man, Alcibiades, agree with a woman about the spinning
of wool, which she understands and he does not?
ALCIBIADES: No, truly.
SOCRATES: Nor has he any need, for spinning is a female accomplishment.
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