| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Voice of the City by O. Henry: ing they separated and arose, and then the Kid was
able to use some of his professional tactics, which had
been useless to him while in the excited clutch of a
200-pound sporting gentleman who was about to lose
$20,000 worth of paraphernalia.
After vanquishing his adversary the Kid hurried
upstairs and through the gambling-room into a
smaller apartment connecting by an arched doorway.
Here was a long table set with choicest chinaware
and silver, and lavishly furnished with food of that
expensive and spectacular sort of which the devotees
The Voice of the City |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac: for an article in this new weekly review of his, in which case you
would show uncommon talent, for all the articles are signed, and you
cannot put in slip-shod work as you can on a small paper. In that case
you would be making a hundred crowns a month. Now, my dear boy, there
are men of ability, like that poor d'Arthez, who dines at Flicoteaux's
every day, who may wait for ten years before they will make a hundred
crowns; and you will be making four thousand francs a year by your
pen, to say nothing of the books you will write for the trade, if you
do work of that kind.
"Now, a sub-prefect's salary only amounts to a thousand crowns, and
there he stops in his arrondissement, wearing away time like the rung
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