| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Court Life in China by Isaac Taylor Headland: sat upon her couch, and had their friends photograph them. I
could not allow myself to do so. I stood silent, with head
uncovered as I gazed with wonder and admiration at the bed, with
its magnificently embroidered curtains hanging from the ceiling
to the floor, its yellow-satin mattress ten feet in length and
its great round, hard pillow, with the delicate silk spreads
turned back as though it were prepared for Her Majesty's return.
On the opposite side of the room there was a brick kang bed, such
as we find in the homes of all the Chinese of the north, where
her maids slept, or sat like silent ghosts while the only woman
that ever ruled over one-third of the human race took her rest.
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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 Country of the Pointed Firs by Sarah Orne Jewett: sort of courtesy, and bore himself with solemn dignity of
importance. We were sorted out according to some clear design of
his own, and stood as speechless as a troop to await his orders.
Even the children were ready to march together, a pretty flock, and
at the last moment Mrs. Blackett and a few distinguished
companions, the ministers and those who were very old, came out of
the house together and took their places. We ranked by fours, and
even then we made a long procession.
There was a wide path mowed for us across the field, and, as
we moved along, the birds flew up out of the thick second crop of
clover, and the bees hummed as if it still were June. There was a
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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 Little Rivers by Henry van Dyke: and a passionately unsuccessful hunter, who would sit all night in
the crotch of a tree beside an alleged deer-lick, and come home
perfectly satisfied if he had heard a hedgehog grunt. It was he
who called attention to the discrepancy between the boy's appetite
and his size by saying loudly at a picnic, "I wouldn't grudge you
what you eat, my boy, if I could only see that it did you any
good,"--which remark was not forgiven until the doctor redeemed his
reputation by pronouncing a serious medical opinion, before a
council of mothers, to the effect that it did not really hurt a boy
to get his feet wet. That was worthy of Galen in his most inspired
moment. And there was hearty, genial Paul Merit, whose mere
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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 Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: everywhere. These semi-learned observations will serve, perhaps, to
vindicate the truth of this study, certain details of which may
frighten the perfected morals of our age, which are, as everybody
knows, a trifle straitlaced.
At the moment when the chanting ceased and the last notes of the
organ, mingling with the vibrations of the loud "A-men" as it issued
from the strong chests of the intoning clergy, sent a murmuring echo
through the distant arches, and the hushed assembly were awaiting the
beneficent words of the archbishop, a burgher, impatient to get home,
or fearing for his purse in the tumult of the crowd when the
worshippers dispersed, slipped quietly away, at the risk of being
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