| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Deserted Woman by Honore de Balzac: like astonishment in her manner.
"With my wife," calmly assented the noble. "Mme. de Beauseant is
descended from the House of Burgundy, on the spindle side, 'tis true,
but the name atones for everything. My wife is very much attached to
the Vicomtesse, and the poor lady has lived alone for such a long
while, that----"
The Marquis de Champignelles looked round about him while he spoke
with an air of cool unconcern, so that it was almost impossible to
guess whether he made a concession to Mme. de Beauseant's misfortunes,
or paid homage to her noble birth; whether he felt flattered to
receive her in his house, or, on the contrary, sheer pride was the
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Scarlet Pimpernel by Baroness Emmuska Orczy: the gavotte, the hum of distant talk and laughter, and the rumble of
an occasional coach outside, only seemed to reach this palace of the
Sleeping Beauty as the murmur of some flitting spooks far away.
It all looked so peaceful, so luxurious, and so still, that
the keenest observer--a veritable prophet--could never have guessed
that, at this present moment, that deserted supper-room was nothing
but a trap laid for the capture of the most cunning and audacious
plotter those stirring times had ever seen.
Chauvelin pondered and tried to peer into the immediate
future. What would this man be like, whom he and the leaders of the
whole revolution had sworn to bring to his death? Everything about
The Scarlet Pimpernel |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Little Britain by Washington Irving: He has therefore made several excursions to Hampstead,
Highgate, and other neighboring towns, where he has passed
whole afternoons in looking back upon the metropolis through
a telescope, and endeavoring to descry the steeple of St.
Bartholomew's. Not a stage-coachman of Bull-and-Mouth
Street but touches his hat as he passes; and he is considered
quite a patron at the coach-office of the Goose and Gridiron,
St. Paul's churchyard. His family have been very urgent for
him to make an expedition to Margate, but he has great doubts
of those new gimcracks, the steamboats, and indeed thinks
himself too advanced in life to undertake sea-voyages.
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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 Marvelous Land of Oz by L. Frank Baum: So he selected a fine, big pumpkin -- one with a lustrous, orange-red color
-- and began carving it. With the point of his knife he made two round eyes,
a three-cornered nose, and
Line-Art Drawing
10
a mouth shaped like a new moon. The face, when completed, could not have
been considered strictly beautiful; but it wore a smile so big and broad,
and was so Jolly in expression, that even Tip laughed as he looked
admiringly at his work.
The child had no playmates, so he did not know that boys often dig out the
inside of a "pumpkin-jack," and in the space thus made put a lighted candle
The Marvelous Land of Oz |
