| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: play many parts, and that on more than one occasion his life had stood
in danger at the hands of foes. At the same time, these tidings were
communicated in a manner calculated to show that the speaker was also
a man of PRACTICAL capabilities. In conclusion, the visitor took out
a cambric pocket-handkerchief, and sneezed into it with a vehemence
wholly new to Tientietnikov's experience. In fact, the sneeze rather
resembled the note which, at times, the trombone of an orchestra
appears to utter not so much from its proper place on the platform as
from the immediate neighbourhood of the listener's ear. And as the
echoes of the drowsy mansion resounded to the report of the explosion
there followed upon the same a wave of perfume, skilfully wafted
Dead Souls |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Virginibus Puerisque by Robert Louis Stevenson: she may have a taste for brandy, and no heart. My compliments
to George Eliot for her Rosamond Vincy; the ugly work of
satire she has transmuted to the ends of art, by the companion
figure of Lydgate; and the satire was much wanted for the
education of young men. That doctrine of the excellence of
women, however chivalrous, is cowardly as well as false. It
is better to face the fact, and know, when you marry, that you
take into your life a creature of equal, if of unlike,
frailties; whose weak human heart beats no more tunefully than
yours.
But it is the object of a liberal education not only to
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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 The White Moll by Frank L. Packard: game for you. I swear it!"
There were footsteps, plainly audible now, out in the main hall.
"Quick!" he urged. "Are we both to be caught? See!" He backed
suddenly toward the window.
"See! I am too far away now to touch that necklace before they get
here. Throw it down, and get behind the portiere of the rear door!"
Mechanically she was retreating. They were almost at the other door
now, those footsteps outside in the main hall. With a backward
spring she reached the portiere. The door handle across the room
rattled. She glanced at the Adventurer. He was close to the window.
It was true, he could not get the necklace and at the same time hope
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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 In the South Seas by Robert Louis Stevenson: the Paumotus. Hither we beat in three tacks, and came to an anchor
close in shore, in the first smooth water since we had left San
Francisco, five fathoms deep, where a man might look overboard all
day at the vanishing cable, the coral patches, and the many-
coloured fish.
Fakarava was chosen to be the seat of Government from nautical
considerations only. It is eccentrically situate; the productions,
even for a low island, poor; the population neither many nor - for
Low Islanders - industrious. But the lagoon has two good passages,
one to leeward, one to windward, so that in all states of the wind
it can be left and entered, and this advantage, for a government of
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