| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Lin McLean by Owen Wister: that she had been examining "Neighbor," and his face hardened suddenly to
fierceness as he looked at her; but he repeated quietly that she had
better come in. Thus did the three sit down to their meal. Occasionally a
word about handing some dish fell from one or other of them, but nothing
more, until Lusk took out his watch and mentioned the hour.
"Yu've not ate especially hearty," said Lin, resting his arms upon the
table.
"I'm going," asserted Lusk. "Governor Barker may start out. I've got my
interests to look after."
"Why, sure," said Lin. "I can't hope you'll waste all your time on just
me."
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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 Malbone: An Oldport Romance by Thomas Wentworth Higginson: conscientiously did what was expected of her, and took her
little amusements meanwhile. It was supposed that most of the
purchasers in the market preferred slang and bare shoulders,
and so she favored them with plenty of both. It was merely the
law of supply and demand. Had John Lambert once hinted that he
would accept her in decent black, she would have gone to the
next ball as a Sister of Charity; but where was the need of it,
when she and her mother both knew that, had she appeared as the
Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, she would not have won him? So her
only resource was a cheerful acquiescence in Emilia's luck, and
a judicious propitiation of the accepted favorite.
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