| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Chouans by Honore de Balzac: "Come, cousin, you know very well," said Pille-Miche, pocketing his
snuff-box which Marche-a-Terre returned to him; "you are condemned."
The two Chouans rose together and took their guns.
"Monsieur Marche-a-Terre, I never said one word about the Gars--"
"I told you to fetch your axe," said Marche-a-Terre.
The hapless man knocked against the wooden bedstead of his son, and
several five-franc pieces rolled on the floor. Pille-Miche picked them
up.
"Ho! ho! the Blues paid you in new money," cried Marche-a-Terre.
"As true as that's the image of Saint-Labre," said Galope-Chopine, "I
have told nothing. Barbette mistook the Fougeres men for the gars of
The Chouans |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Court Life in China by Isaac Taylor Headland: came to me and positively forbade me to keep the slave in her
home. After she had gone the girl came and knelt at my feet and
begged me to save her! How could I send her out to death when she
had been so kind and faithful to me? I finally decided upon a
plan to save her. I determined to flee with her to the home of an
uncle who lived in a town a hundred miles or more from Peking,
where I hoped the Boxers were less powerful than they were at the
capital.
"This uncle was the lieutenant-governor of the province and had
always been very fond of me, and I knew if I could reach him I
should win his sympathy and his aid. But how was this to be done?
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