| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Options by O. Henry: colleges and had come back to lead his people out of Egypt. He was a
man of first-class style and wrote essays, and had been invited to
visit rich guys' houses in Boston and such places.
"There was a Cherokee girl in Muscogee that High Jack was foolish
about. He took me to see her a few times. Her name was Florence Blue
Feather--but you want to clear your mind of all ideas of squaws with
nose-rings and army blankets. This young lady was whiter than you
are, and better educated than I ever was. You couldn't have told her
from any of the girls shopping in the swell Third Avenue stores. I
liked her so well that, I got to calling on her now and then when High
Jack wasn't along, which is the way of friends in such matters. She
Options |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from House of Mirth by Edith Wharton: with him, she had been conscious of something faintly maternal in
her efforts to guide and uplift him. But for the present, if he
clung to her, it was not in order to be dragged up, but to feel
some one floundering in the depths with him: he wanted her to
suffer with him, not to help him to suffer less.
Happily for both, there was little physical strength to sustain
his frenzy. It left him, collapsed and breathing heavily, to an
apathy so deep and prolonged that Lily almost feared the
passers-by would think it the result of a seizure, and stop to
offer their aid. But Monte Carlo is, of all places, the one where
the human bond is least close, and odd sights are the least
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