| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Sarrasine by Honore de Balzac: resonance. At that sound, Marianina, Filippo, and Madame de Lanty
looked toward us, and their glances were like lightning flashes. The
young woman wished that she were at the bottom of the Seine. She took
my arm and pulled me away toward a boudoir. Everybody, men and women,
made room for us to pass. Having reached the further end of the suite
of reception-rooms, we entered a small semi-circular cabinet. My
companion threw herself on a divan, breathing fast with terror, not
knowing where she was.
"You are mad, madame," I said to her.
"But," she rejoined, after a moment's silence, during which I gazed at
her in admiration, "is it my fault? Why does Madame de Lanty allow
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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 Duchess of Padua by Oscar Wilde: [GUIDO clutches his sword.]
Nay, nay, I trust thee not; your hot young blood,
Undisciplined nature, and too violent rage
Will never tarry for this great revenge,
But wreck itself on passion.
GUIDO
Thou knowest me not.
Tell me the man, and I in everything
Will do thy bidding.
MORANZONE
Well, when the time is ripe,
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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 Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: R., in a Leith office, smart, full of happy epithet, amusing. They
are very nice and very kind, asked me to come back - 'any night you
feel dull; and any night doesn't mean no night: we'll be so glad
to see you.' CEST LA MERE QUI PARLE.
I was back there again to-night. There was hymn-singing, and
general religious controversy till eight, after which talk was
secular. Mrs. S. was deeply distressed about the boot business.
She consoled me by saying that many would be glad to have such feet
whatever shoes they had on. Unfortunately, fishers and seafaring
men are too facile to be compared with! This looks like enjoyment:
better speck than Anster.
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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 Sanitary and Social Lectures by Charles Kingsley: making themselves, by innate want of that taste which the
"Parisienne" possesses, only the cause of something like a sneer
from many a cultivated man; and of something like a sneer, too,
from yonder gipsy woman who passes by, with bold bright face, and
swinging hip, and footstep stately and elastic; far better
dressed, according to all true canons of taste, than most town-
girls; and thanking her fate that she and her "Rom" are no house-
dwellers and gaslight-sightseers, but fatten on free air upon the
open moor.
But the face which is beneath that chignon and that hat? Well--it
is sometimes pretty: but how seldom handsome, which is a higher
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