| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Rescue by Joseph Conrad: bringing her stern gradually into view. The people aft, Lingard
noticed, left their places and walked over to the taffrail so as
to keep him longer in sight.
When about a mile off the bank and nearly in line with the stern
of the yacht the brig's topsails fluttered and the yards came
down slowly on the caps; the fore and aft canvas ran down; and
for some time she floated quietly with folded wings upon the
transparent sheet of water, under the radiant silence of the sky.
Then her anchor went to the bottom with a rumbling noise
resembling the roll of distant thunder. In a moment her head
tended to the last puffs of the northerly airs and the ensign at
 The Rescue |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Professor by Charlotte Bronte: and a grass-plat, looking pleasant in the sunshine of the mild
spring evening-for it was now the middle of April.
This, then, was my first glimpse of the garden; but I had not
time to look long, the portress, after having answered in the
affirmative my question as to whether her mistress was at home,
opened the folding-doors of a room to the left, and having
ushered me in, closed them behind me. I found myself in a salon
with a very well-painted, highly varnished floor; chairs and
sofas covered with white draperies, a green porcelain stove,
walls hung with pictures in gilt frames, a gilt pendule and other
ornaments on the mantelpiece, a large lustre pendent from the
 The Professor |