| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: to utter shrill screams, while La Jean-Jean, whose leg had been
burned and could not longer support her, fell to the ground at
full length.
"Sister Saint-Benedict left the dead man, ran up to her infirm
old women, and without a word or a look for me wrapped their
shawls round them, gave them their crutches, pushed them to the
door, made them go out, and disappeared with them into the dark
night.
"I saw that I could not even let a hussar accompany them, for the
mere rattle of a sword would have sent them mad with fear.
"The cure was still looking at the dead man; but at last he
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Mistress Wilding by Rafael Sabatini: constrained away. He did not intend..."
"Tais-toi!" blazed Feversham. "Did I interrogate you? It is for
Mistaire Westercott to answer." He set a hand on the table and leaned
forward towards Wilding, his face very malign. "You shall to answer
for yourself, Mistaire Wildin'; I promise you you shall to answer for
yourself." He turned again to Richard. "Ek, bien?" he snapped. "Will
you speak?"
Richard came forward a step; he was certainly nervous, and certainly
pale; but neither as pale nor as nervous as from our knowledge of
Richard we might have looked to see him at that moment.
"It is in a measure true," he said. "But what Mr. Wilding has said is
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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 Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte: basket of German wools, asked if I should like to go upstairs. I
replied in the affirmative, of course.
'Matilda, take a candle, and show her her room,' said she.
Miss Matilda, a strapping hoyden of about fourteen, with a short
frock and trousers, shrugged her shoulders and made a slight
grimace, but took a candle and proceeded before me up the back
stairs (a long, steep, double flight), and through a long, narrow
passage, to a small but tolerably comfortable room. She then asked
me if I would take some tea or coffee. I was about to answer No;
but remembering that I had taken nothing since seven o'clock that
morning, and feeling faint in consequence, I said I would take a
 Agnes Grey |
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 White Moll by Frank L. Packard: the garret, and I'd be waiting for them, - and we'd split up the
swag, and everybody'd be on his own after that." Again he laughed
out raucously. "It'll take them half an hour to get together - but
it won't take that long for us to grab all that's worth grabbing
out of that trap-door, and making our getaway. See? I'll teach
them to throw Pierre Danglar down! Come on, hurry!"
"Sure!" she mumbled mechanically.
Her mind was sifting, sorting, weighing what he had said. She was
not surprised. She remembered Pinkie Bonn's outburst in the boat.
She walked on beside Danglar. The man was muttering and cursing
under his breath. Well, why shouldn't she appear to fall in with
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