| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield: rolling round the blind-stick, and the little tassel tapped as if trying to
get free. That was too much for Constantia.
"Don't you think--don't you think we might put it off for another day?" she
whispered.
"Why?" snapped Josephine, feeling, as usual, much better now that she knew
for certain that Constantia was terrified. "It's got to be done. But I do
wish you wouldn't whisper, Con."
"I didn't know I was whispering," whispered Constantia.
"And why do you keep staring at the bed?" said Josephine, raising her voice
almost defiantly. "There's nothing on the bed."
"Oh, Jug, don't say so!" said poor Connie. "At any rate, not so loudly."
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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 Pool in the Desert by Sara Jeanette Duncan: who have scruples about taking advantage of so intimate and
unguarded an opportunity, but Armour, I rapidly decided, was not one
of these. His sophistication was progressing, but it had not
reached that point. He wanted something--I flew instantly to the
mad conclusion that he wanted Dora. I did not pause to inquire why
he should ask her of me. It had seemed for a long time eminently
proper that anybody who wanted Dora should ask her of me. The
application was impossible, but applications nearly always were
impossible. Nobody knew that better than the Secretary to the
Government of India in the Home Department.
I squared my shoulders and we got through the soup. It was
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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 Enemies of Books by William Blades: filled with Hebrew lore, differed in many respects from any other I
have seen. He was longer, thinner, and more delicate looking than any
of his English congeners. He was transparent, like thin ivory, and had
a dark line through his body, which I took to be the intestinal canal.
He resigned his life with extreme procrastination, and died "deeply lamented"
by his keeper, who had long looked forward to his final development.
The difficulty of breeding these worms is probably due to their formation.
When in a state of nature they can by expansion and contraction of
the body working upon the sides of their holes, push their horny jaws
against the opposing mass of paper. But when freed from the restraint,
which indeed to them is life, they CANNOT eat although surrounded
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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 Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland by Olive Schreiner: "'And that light flickered and flared, as it listed. It went this way and
it went that; it burnt blue, and green, and red; now it disappeared
altogether, and then it burnt up again. And men, far out at sea, kept
their eyes fixed where they knew the light should be: saying, 'We are
safe; the great light will lead us when we near the rocks.' And on dark
nights men drifted nearer and nearer; and in the stillness of the midnight
they struck on the lighthouse rocks and went down at its feet.
"'What now shall be done to that light, in that it was not a rushlight; in
that it was set on high by the hands of men, and in that men trusted it?
Shall it not be put out?'
"And if he shall answer, saying, 'What are men to me? they are fools, all
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