| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: not seem embarrassed by the meeting, but threw us his remarks
like favours, and strode magisterially by us towards the
shaft and tunnel.
Presently we heard his voice raised to his companion. "We
drifted every sort of way, but couldn't strike the ledge."
Then again: "It pinched out here." And once more: "Every
minor that ever worked upon it says there's bound to be a
ledge somewhere."
These were the snatches of his talk that reached us, and they
had a damning significance. We, the lords of Silverado, had
come face to face with our superior. It is the worst of all
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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 Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: "Gnekker was secretly married to Liza yesterday. Return."
I read the telegram, and my dismay does not last long. I am
dismayed, not by what Liza and Gnekker have done, but by the
indifference with which I hear of their marriage. They say
philosophers and the truly wise are indifferent. It is false:
indifference is the paralysis of the soul; it is premature death.
I go to bed again, and begin trying to think of something to
occupy my mind. What am I to think about? I feel as though
everything had been thought over already and there is nothing
which could hold my attention now.
When daylight comes I sit up in bed with my arms round my knees,
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