| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Village Rector by Honore de Balzac: the drear expanse, seeming to take a savage pleasure in contemplating
that vast image of desolation. Farrabesche was right. No power, no
will could put to any use whatever that soil which resounded under the
horses' feet as though it were hollow. This effect was produced by the
natural porousness of the clay; but there were fissures also through
which the water flowed away, no doubt to some distant source.
"There are many souls like this," thought Veronique, stopping her
horse after she had ridden at full speed for fifteen or twenty
minutes. She remained motionless and thoughtful in the midst of this
desert, where there was neither animal nor insect life and where the
birds never flew. The plain of Montegnac was at least pebbly or sandy;
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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 The Exiles by Honore de Balzac: this strand, then liable to frequent floods, was a constable of the
watch of the City of Paris, who had been able to do some service to
their Reverences the Chapter of the Cathedral; and in return the
Bishop leased him twenty-five perches of land, with exemptions from
all feudal dues or taxes on the buildings he might erect.
Seven years before the beginning of this narrative, Joseph Tirechair,
one of the sternest of Paris constables, as his name (Tear Flesh)
would indicate, had, thanks to his share of the fines collected by him
for delinquencies committed within the precincts of the Cite, had been
able to build a house on the bank of the Seine just at the end of the
Rue du Port-Saint-Landry. To protect the merchandise landed on the
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