| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Monster Men by Edgar Rice Burroughs: another moment all were huddled in the center of the campong.
As cattle are driven, von Horn drove the miserable
creatures toward the door of the workshop. At the
threshold of the dark interior the frightened things
halted fearfully, and then as von Horn urged them on
from behind with his cruel whip they milled as cattle
at the entrance to a strange corral.
Again and again he urged them for the door, but each
time they turned away, and to escape the whip beat and
tore at the wall of the palisade in a vain effort to
batter it from their pathway. Their roars and shrieks
The Monster Men |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Case of the Golden Bullet by Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner: bedroom. He found Bauer stooping over the picture of the French
soldier. There was a hole in the left breast, where the bullet,
passing through, had buried itself in the back of the chair.
"Yes, it was all just as you said," began the chief of police,
holding out his hand to Muller. "But - why the golden bullet?"
"To-morrow, to-morrow," replied the detective, looking up at his
superior with a glance of pleading.
They left the house together and in less than an hour's time Muller
was again in the train rolling towards the capital.
He went to the goldsmith's shop as soon as he arrived. The
proprietor received him with eager interest and Muller handed him
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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 Cruise of the Jasper B. by Don Marquis: But nothing was further from Cleggett than the wish ever to go
into the Enterprise office again. As he left the elevator on the
ground floor he stabbed the astonished elevator boy under the
left arm with his cane as a bayonet, cut him harmlessly over the
head with his cane as a saber, tossed him a dollar, and left the
building humming:
"Oh, the Beau Sabreur of the Grande Armee
Was the Captain Tarjeanterre!"
It is thus, with a single twitch of her playful fingers, that
Fate will sometimes pluck from a man the mask that has obscured
his real identity for many years. It is thus that Destiny will
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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 Nana, Miller's Daughter, Captain Burle, Death of Olivier Becaille by Emile Zola: which was too tight for her, and Caroline Hequet, clad as usual in
ribbed black silk, trimmed with Chantilly lace. Lea de Horn came
next, terribly dressed up, as her wont was, and after her the big
Tatan Nene, a good-humored fair girl with the bosom of a wet nurse,
at which people laughed, and finally little Maria Blond, a young
damsel of fifteen, as thin and vicious as a street child, yet on the
high road to success, owing to her recent first appearance at the
Folies. Labordette had brought the whole collection in a single
fly, and they were stlll laughing at the way they had been squeezed
with Maria Blond on her knees. But on entering the room they pursed
up their lips, and all grew very conventional as they shook hands
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