| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: of the renewal of such a relation? Was the figure in the carpet
traceable or describable only for husbands and wives - for lovers
supremely united? It came back to me in a mystifying manner that
in Kensington Square, when I mentioned that Corvick would have told
the girl he loved, some word had dropped from Vereker that gave
colour to this possibility. There might be little in it, but there
was enough to make me wonder if I should have to marry Mrs. Corvick
to get what I wanted. Was I prepared to offer her this price for
the blessing of her knowledge? Ah that way madness lay! - so I at
least said to myself in bewildered hours. I could see meanwhile
the torch she refused to pass on flame away in her chamber of
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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 Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: historic soul, with her sorrows and the remoteness of a daily life
busied with rustic simplicities and the scents of primeval herbs.
I was not incompetent at herb-gathering, and after a while,
when I had sat long enough waking myself to new thoughts, and
reading a page of remembrance with new pleasure, I gathered some
bunches, as I was bound to do, and at last we met again higher up
the shore, in the plain every-day world we had left behind when we
went down to the penny-royal plot. As we walked together along the
high edge of the field we saw a hundred sails about the bay and
farther seaward; it was mid-afternoon or after, and the day was
coming to an end.
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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 Enchanted Island of Yew by L. Frank Baum: "Thanks! Thank you very much!" answered the king, ceasing to weep.
"I have always expected to be hanged some day, and I am glad no one
but you two boys will witness me when my feet begin kicking about."
"I shall not kick," declared another of the thieves, who had also
regained his senses. "I shall sing while I am being hanged."
"But you can not, my good Gunder," protested the king; "for the rope
will cut off your breath, and no man can sing without breath."
"Then I shall whistle," said Gunder, composedly.
The king cast at him a look of reproach, and turning to Prince Marvel
he said:
"It will be a great task to string up so many thieves. You look
The Enchanted Island of Yew |
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 Deputy of Arcis by Honore de Balzac: "My dear moralist, I don't admit your theory in the least. As for
Monsieur de Sallenauve, he will be much too busy with his duties in
the Chamber to think of me. Besides, he is a man who is full of self-
respect; he will be mortified by my manner, which will seem to him
both ungrateful and unjust. If I try to put two feet of distance
between us, he will put four; you may rely on that."
"And /you/, my dear?" asked Madame de Camps.
"How do you mean?--I?"
"You who are not busy, who have no Chamber to occupy your mind; you
who have, I will agree, a great deal of self-respect, but who know as
little about the things of the heart as the veriest school-girl,--what
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