| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from An Inland Voyage by Robert Louis Stevenson: about this and the other subject; we did not want to disgrace our
native land by messing an eight, or toiling pitifully in the wake
of the champion canoeist. In short, we had recourse to flight. It
seemed ungrateful, but we tried to make that good on a card loaded
with sincere compliments. And indeed it was no time for scruples;
we seemed to feel the hot breath of the champion on our necks.
AT MAUBEUGE
PARTLY from the terror we had of our good friends the Royal
Nauticals, partly from the fact that there were no fewer than
fifty-five locks between Brussels and Charleroi, we concluded that
we should travel by train across the frontier, boats and 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 Glaucus/The Wonders of the Shore by Charles Kingsley: somewhat effeminate one; and think that it can at best help to
while away a leisure hour harmlessly, and perhaps usefully, as a
substitute for coarser sports, or for the reading of novels.
Those, however, who have followed it out, especially on the sea-
shore, know better. They can tell from experience, that over and
above its accessory charms of pure sea-breezes, and wild rambles by
cliff and loch, the study itself has had a weighty moral effect
upon their hearts and spirits. There are those who can well
understand how the good and wise John Ellis, amid all his
philanthropic labours for the good of the West Indies, while he was
spending his intellect and fortune in introducing into our tropic
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from An Old Maid by Honore de Balzac: struggle openly began between the most august, grandest, and only true
power, ROYALTY, and the most false, most changeful, most oppressive of
all powers,--the power called PARLIAMENTARY, which elective assemblies
exercise. The salon du Ronceret, secretly allied to the Cormon salon,
was boldly liberal.
The Abbe de Sponde, after his return from Prebaudet, bore many and
continual sufferings, which he kept within his breast, saying no word
of them to his niece. But to Mademoiselle Armande he opened his heart,
admitting that, folly for folly, he would much have preferred the
Chevalier de Valois to Monsieur du Bousquier. Never would the dear
chevalier have had the bad taste to contradict and oppose a poor old
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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 Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers by Jonathan Swift: Nor am I at all offended, or think it an injury to the art, when
I see the common dealers in it, the students in astrology, the
philomaths, and the rest of that tribe, treated by wise men with
the utmost scorn and contempt; but rather wonder, when I observe
gentlemen in the country, rich enough to serve the nation in
parliament, poring in Partridge's almanack, to find out the
events of the year at home and abroad; not daring to propose a
hunting-match, till Gadbury or he have fixed the weather.
I will allow either of the two I have mentioned, or any other of
the fraternity, to be not only astrologers, but conjurers too, if
I do not produce a hundred instances in all their almanacks, to
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