| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: The Brazilian went away the happiest man in Paris.
At noon Valerie and Lisbeth were chatting in the splendid bedroom
where this dangerous woman was giving to her dress those finishing
touches which a lady alone can give. The doors were bolted, the
curtains drawn over them, and Valerie related in every detail all the
events of the evening, the night, the morning.
"What do you think of it all, my darling?" she said to Lisbeth in
conclusion. "Which shall I be when the time comes--Madame Crevel, or
Madame Montes?"
"Crevel will not last more than ten years, such a profligate as he
is," replied Lisbeth. "Montes is young. Crevel will leave you about
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Wheels of Chance by H. G. Wells: heavy like the drapery."
"There's heavy brain labour, you must remember."
"That wouldn't hurt YOU," said Mr. Hoopdriver, turning a
compliment.
"It's like this," he said, ending a pause. "It's a juiced
nuisance alluding to these matters, but--we got very little more
money."
He perceived that Jessie started, though he did not look at her.
"I was counting, of course, on your friend's writing and your
being able to take some action to-day." 'Take some action' was a
phrase he had learnt at his last 'swop.'
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott: when she had newly cleaned his cage, made Mop bark by pecking
at him while Madam dozed, called her names before company, and
behaved in all respects like an reprehensible old bird. Then she
could not endure the dog, a fat, cross beast who snarled and
yelped at her when she made his toilet, and who lay on his back
with all his legs in the air and a most idiotic expression of
countenance when he wanted something to eat, which was about a
dozen times a day. The cook was bad-tempered, the old coachman
was deaf, and Esther the only one who ever took any notice of
the young lady.
Esther was a Frenchwoman, who had lived with`Madame', as
Little Women |
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 Man against the Sky by Edwin Arlington Robinson: My one distinction, and a parlous toll
To glory; but hope lives on clamorous.
"'Twas hope, though heaven I grant you knows of what --
The kind that blinks and rises when it falls,
Whether it sees a reason why or not --
That heard Broadway's hard-throated siren-calls;
"'Twas hope that brought me through December storms,
To shores again where I'll not have to be
A lonely man with only foreign worms
To cheer him in his last obscurity.
"But what it was that hurried me down here
|
