| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Bride of Lammermoor by Walter Scott: daughter as his wife; he might very easily present Lady Ashton as
his daughter, so little does she differ from what I remember her
some years since. Will she permit an old
acquaintance the privilege of a guest?"
He saluted the lady with too good a grace to apprehend a
repulse, and then proceeded: "This, Lady Ashton, is a peacemaking
visit, and therefore I presume to introduce my cousin, the young
Master of Ravenswood, to your favourable notice."
Lady Ashton could not choose but courtesy; but there was in her
obeisance an air of haughtiness approaching to contemptuous
repulse. Ravenswood could not choose but bow; but his manner
The Bride of Lammermoor |
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 Deserted Woman by Honore de Balzac: his own man, telling him to give the letter himself into Mme. de
Beauseant's hands, and to say that it was a matter of life and death
for his master. The messenger went. M. de Nueil went back to the
drawing-room where his wife was still murdering the /Caprice/, and sat
down to wait till the answer came. An hour later, when the /Caprice/
had come to an end, and the husband and wife sat in silence on
opposite sides of the hearth, the man came back from Valleroy and gave
his master his own letter, unopened.
M. de Nueil went into a small room beyond the drawing-room, where he
had left his rifle, and shot himself.
The swift and fatal ending of the drama, contrary as it is to all the
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