| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland by Olive Schreiner: had so often run away to go a-fishing, or a-bird's-nesting. He saw the
prints on the school house wall on which the afternoon sun used to shine
when he was kept in; Jesus of Judea blessing the children, and one picture
just over the door where he hung with his arms stretched out and the blood
dropping from his feet. Then Peter Halket thought of the tower at the
ruins which he had climbed so often for birds' eggs; and he saw his mother
standing at her cottage gate when he came home in the evening, and he felt
her arms round his neck as she kissed him; but he felt her tears on his
cheek, because he had run away from school all day; and he seemed to be
making apologies to her, and promising he never would do it again if only
she would not cry. He had often thought of her since he left her, on board
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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 Message by Honore de Balzac: perhaps for the only time in my life, I used tact, and knew in
what the special skill of courtiers and men of the world
consists.
I have had so many battles to fight since those heedless days,
that they have left me no time to distil all the least actions of
daily life, and to do everything so that it falls in with those
rules of etiquette and good taste which wither the most generous
emotions.
"M. le Comte," I said with an air of mystery, "I should like a
few words with you," and I fell back a pace or two.
He followed my example. Juliette left us together, going away
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