| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: say? He'll just hand me a pass to Bellevue and tell me to come back
when I get cured. I might turn in a story about a sea serpent wiggling
up Broadway, but I haven't got the nerve to try 'em with a pipe like
this. A get-rich-quick scheme--excuse me--gang giving back the boodle!
Oh, no. I'm not on the comic supplement."
"You can't understand it, of course," says Buck, with his hand on the
door knob. "Me and Pick ain't Wall Streeters like you know 'em. We
never allowed to swindle sick old women and working girls and take
nickels off of kids. In the lines of graft we've worked we took money
from the people the Lord made to be buncoed--sports and rounders and
smart Alecks and street crowds, that always have a few dollars to
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Finished by H. Rider Haggard: at a venture, but the arrow went home, for I saw his jaw drop.)
"Further, I believe you to be an illicit diamond buyer, and I
believe also that you have again been arranging with the Basutos
to make an end of us, though of these last two items at present I
lack positive proof. Now, Dr. Rodd, I ask you for the second
time whether you are a person to accuse others of crimes and
whether, should you do so, you will be considered a credible
witness when your own are brought to light?"
"If had been guilty of any of these things, which I am not, it is
obvious that my partner must have shared in all of them, except
the first. So if you inform against me, you inform against him,
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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 Bucolics by Virgil: Where, foremost writ, the name of Varus stands.
Speed ye, Pierian Maids! Within a cave
Young Chromis and Mnasyllos chanced to see
Silenus sleeping, flushed, as was his wont,
With wine of yesterday. Not far aloof,
Slipped from his head, the garlands lay, and there
By its worn handle hung a ponderous cup.
Approaching- for the old man many a time
Had balked them both of a long hoped-for song-
Garlands to fetters turned, they bind him fast.
Then Aegle, fairest of the Naiad-band,
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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 Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: ungrateful and boring art, that he was not an artist, that none
but fools thought that he had any talent, and all at once, for no
rhyme or reason, he snatched up a knife and with it scraped over
his very best sketch. After his tea he sat plunged in gloom at
the window and gazed at the Volga. And now the Volga was dingy,
all of one even colour without a gleam of light, cold-looking.
Everything, everything recalled the approach of dreary, gloomy
autumn. And it seemed as though nature had removed now from the
Volga the sumptuous green covers from the banks, the brilliant
reflections of the sunbeams, the transparent blue distance, and
all its smart gala array, and had packed it away in boxes till
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