| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Hero of Our Time by M.Y. Lermontov: "Yes, sir, of course! It was a very ingenious
trick! However, these Asiatic pistols often
miss fire if they are badly oiled or if you don't
press hard enough on the trigger. I confess I
don't like the Circassian carbines either. Some-
how or other they don't suit the like of us: the
butt end is so small, and any minute you may
get your nose burnt! On the other hand, their
sabres, now -- well, all I need say is, my best
respects to them!"
Afterwards he said, on reflecting a little:
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Arizona Nights by Stewart Edward White: According to my belief another minute would have buried the hook
in the Mexican's neck. Anyway, I thrust the muzzle of my Colt's
into the sailor's face.
"What's this?" I asked.
The sailor looked up at me without changing his position. He was
not the least bit afraid.
"This man has my coat," he explained.
"Where'd you get the coat?" I asked the Mex.
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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 A Princess of Parms by Edgar Rice Burroughs: sick, sore, and disgusted, toward the chariots which bore my
retinue and my belongings. A murmur of Martian applause
greeted me, but I cared not for it.
Bleeding and weak I reached my women, who, accustomed to
such happenings, dressed my wounds, applying the wonderful
healing and remedial agents which make only the most
instantaneous of death blows fatal. Give a Martian woman
a chance and death must take a back seat. They soon had
me patched up so that, except for weakness from loss of
blood and a little soreness around the wound, I suffered no
great distress from this thrust which, under earthly treatment,
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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 Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: The whole neighbourhood of Mount Saint Helena, now so quiet
and sylvan, was once alive with mining camps and villages.
Here there would be two thousand souls under canvas; there
one thousand or fifteen hundred ensconced, as if for ever, in
a town of comfortable houses. But the luck had failed, the
mines petered out; and the army of miners had departed, and
left this quarter of the world to the rattlesnakes and deer
and grizzlies, and to the slower but steadier advance of
husbandry.
It was with an eye on one of these deserted places, Pine
Flat, on the Geysers road, that we had come first to
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