| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Bronte Sisters: and gentlemen all? Very well. I'll do my best to amuse you.'
She and Lord Lowborough occupied the apartments next to mine. I
know not how she passed the night, but I lay awake the greater part
of it listening to his heavy step pacing monotonously up and down
his dressing-room, which was nearest my chamber. Once I heard him
pause and throw something out of the window with a passionate
ejaculation; and in the morning, after they were gone, a keen-
bladed clasp-knife was found on the grass-plot below; a razor,
likewise, was snapped in two and thrust deep into the cinders of
the grate, but partially corroded by the decaying embers. So
strong had been the temptation to end his miserable life, so
The Tenant of Wildfell Hall |
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 Another Study of Woman by Honore de Balzac: "Why?" asked the Princesse de Cadignan eagerly.
"Unique and true love," said de Marsay, "produces a sort of corporeal
apathy attuned to the contemplation into which one falls. Then the
mind complicates everything; it works on itself, pictures its fancies,
turns them into reality and torment; and such jealousy is as
delightful as it is distressing."
A foreign minister smiled as, by the light of memory, he felt the
truth of this remark.
"Besides," de Marsay went on, "I said to myself, why miss a happy
hour? Was it not better to go, even though feverish? And, then, if she
learns that I am ill, I believe her capable of hurrying here and
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