| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Touchstone by Edith Wharton: Glennard took the book with sudden eagerness. "Who was Madame
Commanville?"
"His sister." He was conscious that Flamel was looking at him
with the smile that was like an interrogation point. "I didn't
know you cared for this kind of thing."
"I don't--at least I've never had the chance. Have you many
collections of letters?"
"Lord, no--very few. I'm just beginning, and most of the
interesting ones are out of my reach. Here's a queer little
collection, though--the rarest thing I've got--half a dozen of
Shelley's letters to Harriet Westbrook. I had a devil of a time
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Albert Savarus by Honore de Balzac: was owner of the two hills, but not of the upper valley thus flooded,
through which there had been at all times a right-of-way to where it
ends in a horseshoe under the Dent de Vilard. But this ferocious old
man was so widely dreaded, that so long as he lived no claim was urged
by the inhabitants of Riceys, the little village on the further side
of the Dent de Vilard. When the Baron died, he left the slopes of the
two Rouxey hills joined by a strong wall, to protect from inundation
the two lateral valleys opening into the valley of Rouxey, to the
right and left at the foot of the Dent de Vilard. Thus he died the
master of the Dent de Vilard.
His heirs asserted their protectorate of the village of Riceys, and so
Albert Savarus |
