| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Dream Life and Real Life by Olive Schreiner: suddenly, and the younger woman came in.
"I had to come--I couldn't wait. You have heard, he was married this
morning? Oh, do you think it is true? Do help me!" She put out her
hands.
"Sit down. Yes, it is quite true."
"Oh, it is so terrible, and I didn't know anything! Did you ever say
anything to him?" She caught the woman's hands.
"I never saw him again after the day you were here,--so I could not speak
to him,--but I did what I could." She stood looking passively into the
fire.
"And they say she is quite a child, only eighteen. They say he only saw
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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 Light of Western Stars by Zane Grey: with their stray cattle, they'd fall daid at sight of a little
money."
"Please tell me, Mr. Stillwell, exactly what you would do here if
you had unlimited means?" went on Madeline.
"Good Lud!" ejaculated the rancher, and started so he dropped his
pipe. Then with his clumsy huge fingers he refilled it,
relighted it, took a few long pulls, puffed great clouds of
smoke, and, squaring round, hands on his knees, he looked at
Madeline with piercing intentness. His hard face began to relax
and soften and wrinkle into a smile.
"Wal, Miss Majesty, it jest makes my old heart warm up to think
The Light of Western Stars |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Chita: A Memory of Last Island by Lafcadio Hearn: where the ground was high. "Never go there," said Carmen; "there
is a Dead Man there,--will bite you!" And yet, one day, while
Carmen was unusually busy, Chita went there.
In the early days of the settlement, a Spanish fisherman had
died; and his comrades had built him a little tomb with the
surplus of the same bricks and other material brought down the
bayou for the construction of Viosca's cottages. But no one,
except perhaps some wandering duck hunter, had approached the
sepulchre for years. High weeds and grasses wrestled together
all about it, and rendered it totally invisible from the
surrounding level of the marsh.
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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 The Tapestried Chamber by Walter Scott: before I dared open my eyes, lest they should again encounter the
horrible spectacle. When, however, I summoned courage to look
up, she was no longer visible. My first idea was to pull my
bell, wake the servants, and remove to a garret or a hay-loft, to
be ensured against a second visitation. Nay, I will confess the
truth that my resolution was altered, not by the shame of
exposing myself, but by the fear that, as the bell-cord hung by
the chimney, I might, in making my way to it, be again crossed by
the fiendish hag, who, I figured to myself, might be still
lurking about some corner of the apartment.
"I will not pretend to describe what hot and cold fever-fits
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