| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Happy Prince and Other Tales by Oscar Wilde: "Is that the end of the story?" asked the Water-rat.
"Certainly not," answered the Linnet, "that is the beginning."
"Then you are quite behind the age," said the Water-rat. "Every
good story-teller nowadays starts with the end, and then goes on to
the beginning, and concludes with the middle. That is the new
method. I heard all about it the other day from a critic who was
walking round the pond with a young man. He spoke of the matter at
great length, and I am sure he must have been right, for he had
blue spectacles and a bald head, and whenever the young man made
any remark, he always answered 'Pooh!' But pray go on with your
story. I like the Miller immensely. I have all kinds of beautiful
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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 Wrong Box by Stevenson & Osbourne: third, bound in morocco, in the possession of Gideon Forsyth. To
account for the very different fate attending this third
exemplar, the readiest theory is to suppose that Gideon admired
the tale. How to explain that admiration might appear (to those
who have perused the work) more difficult; but the weakness of a
parent is extreme, and Gideon (and not his uncle, whose initials
he had humorously borrowed) was the author of Who Put Back the
Clock? He had never acknowledged it, or only to some intimate
friends while it was still in proof; after its appearance and
alarming failure, the modesty of the novelist had become more
pressing, and the secret was now likely to be better kept than
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