| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: such a work about; and he had Tom Redruth shot; and - well, if
that's a Author, give me Pew!"
"Don't you believe in a future state?" said Smollett. "Do you
think there's nothing but the present story-paper?"
"I don't rightly know for that," said Silver; "and I don't see what
it's got to do with it, anyway. What I know is this: if there is
sich a thing as a Author, I'm his favourite chara'ter. He does me
fathoms better'n he does you - fathoms, he does. And he likes
doing me. He keeps me on deck mostly all the time, crutch and all;
and he leaves you measling in the hold, where nobody can't see you,
nor wants to, and you may lay to that! If there is a Author, by
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from All's Well That Ends Well by William Shakespeare: own grace will keep you where you are, though there were no
further danger known but the modesty which is so lost.
DIANA.
You shall not need to fear me.
WIDOW.
I hope so.--Look, here comes a pilgrim. I know she will lie
at my house: thither they send one another; I'll question her.--
[Enter HELENA in the dress of a pilgrim.]
God save you, pilgrim! Whither are bound?
HELENA.
To Saint Jaques-le-Grand.
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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 Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: good feeling which you must understand, and which I cannot speak of
here, as they reopen wounds still ready to bleed----"
The Baroness telegraphed a signal to Hortense, who tucked her little
one under her arm, saying, "Come Wenceslas, and have your bath!--Good-
bye, Monsieur Crevel."
The Baroness also bowed to Crevel without a word; and Crevel could not
help smiling at the child's astonishment when threatened with this
impromptu tubbing.
"You, monsieur," said Victorin, when he found himself alone with
Lisbeth, his wife, and his father-in-law, "are about to marry a woman
loaded with the spoils of my father; it was she who, in cold blood,
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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 Jolly Corner by Henry James: he re-pocketed his key, looking up and down, they took in the
comparatively harsh actuality of the Avenue, which reminded him of
the assault of the outer light of the Desert on the traveller
emerging from an Egyptian tomb. But he risked before they stepped
into the street his gathered answer to her speech. "For me it IS
lived in. For me it is furnished." At which it was easy for her
to sigh "Ah yes!" all vaguely and discreetly; since his parents and
his favourite sister, to say nothing of other kin, in numbers, had
run their course and met their end there. That represented, within
the walls, ineffaceable life.
It was a few days after this that, during an hour passed with her
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