| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Cousin Betty by Honore de Balzac: the whole house, he inhabited only the ground floor. When Lisbeth went
to keep house for him, she at once wished to let the first floor,
which, as she said, would pay the whole rent, so that the Count would
live almost rent-free; but the old soldier would not hear of it.
For some months past the Marshal had had many sad thoughts. He had
guessed how miserably poor his sister-in-law was, and suspected her
griefs without understanding their cause. The old man, so cheerful in
his deafness, became taciturn; he could not help thinking that his
house would one day be a refuge for the Baroness and her daughter; and
it was for them that he kept the first floor. The smallness of his
fortune was so well known at headquarters, that the War Minister, the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Warlord of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs: through solid vitreous walls I went more carefully.
We had proceeded but a few yards along the corridor that had
given us entrance to this strange maze when Woola gave mouth to
a most frightful roar, at the same time dashing against the clear
partition at our left.
The resounding echoes of that fearsome cry were still
reverberating through the subterranean chambers when I saw the
thing that had startled it from the faithful beast.
The Warlord of Mars |
