| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Heritage of the Desert by Zane Grey: lay still and went to sleep.
Daylight brought him the relief of a clear head and cooled blood. The
camp had been pitched close under the red wall. A lichen-covered cliff,
wet with dripping water, overhung a round pool. A ditch led the water
down the ridge to a pond. Cattle stood up to their knees drinking;
others lay on the yellow clay, which was packed as hard as stone; still
others were climbing the ridge and passing down on both sides.
"You look as if you enjoyed that water," remarked Naab, when Hare
presented himself at the fire. "Well, it's good, only a little salty.
Seeping Springs this is, and it's mine. This ridge we call The Saddle;
you see it dips between wall and mountain and separates two valleys.
The Heritage of the Desert |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: influence of Cornelius could powerfully support the negotiations now
begun by Desquerdes, the general to whom Louis XI. had given the
command of the army encamped on the frontiers of Belgium. These two
master-foxes were, therefore, like two duellists, whose arms are
paralyzed by chance.
So, whether it were that from that day the king's health failed and
went from bad to worse, or that Cornelius did assist in bringing into
France Marguerite of Burgundy--who arrived at Ambroise in July, 1438,
to marry the Dauphin to whom she was betrothed in the chapel of the
castle--certain it is that the king took no steps in the matter of the
hidden treasure; he levied no tribute from his silversmith, and the
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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 Under the Red Robe by Stanley Weyman: was for a little of the good Armagnac I had wasted on
those louts of merchants in the kitchen below. It might
have done me good now.
I had wearily strapped up one bag, and nearly filled the
other, when I came upon something which did, for the
moment, rouse the devil in me. This was the tiny
orange-coloured sachet which Mademoiselle had dropped
the night I first saw her at the inn, and which, it will
be remembered, I picked up. Since that night I had not
seen it, and had as good as forgotten it. Now, as I
folded up my other doublet, the one I had then been
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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 Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: your car."
"Go away NOW, old sport?"
"Go to Atlantic City for a week, or up to Montreal."
He wouldn't consider it. He couldn't possibly leave Daisy until he knew
what she was going to do. He was clutching at some last hope and I
couldn't bear to shake him free.
It was this night that he told me the strange story of his youth with
Dan Cody--told it to me because "Jay Gatsby." had broken up like glass
against Tom's hard malice, and the long secret extravaganza was played
out. I think that he would have acknowledged anything now, without
reserve, but he wanted to talk about Daisy.
The Great Gatsby |
