| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: into the kitchen. He went up to Lena and said without looking at
her, "Get your things on and come with me!"
The tones of his voice startled her, and she said angrily,
dropping the soap, "Are you drunk?"
"If you do not come with me, I will take you--you had better
come," said Canute quietly.
She lifted a sheet to strike him, but he caught her arm
roughly and wrenched the sheet from her. He turned to the wall and
took down a hood and shawl that hung there, and began wrapping her
up. Lena scratched and fought like a wild thing. Ole stood in the
door, cursing, and Mary howled and screeched at the top of her
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia by Samuel Johnson: comfort her by telling her that all had their troubles, and that
Lady Pekuah had enjoyed much happiness in the world for a long
time, and might reasonably expect a change of fortune. They hoped
that some good would befall her wheresoever she was, and that their
mistress would find another friend who might supply her place.
The Princess made them no answer; and they continued the form of
condolence, not much grieved in their hearts that the favourite was
lost.
Next day the Prince presented to the Bassa a memorial of the wrong
which he had suffered, and a petition for redress. The Bassa
threatened to punish the robbers, but did not attempt to catch
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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 The Firm of Nucingen by Honore de Balzac: weep.) "Woe unto the French imagination when men fain would blunt the
needle points of her pleasant humor! Dies iroe! Let us weep for
Candide. Long live the Kritik of Pure Reason, La Symbolique, and the
systems in five closely packed volumes, printed by Germans, who little
suspect that the gist of the matter has been known in Paris since
1750, and crystallized in a few trenchant words--the diamonds of our
national thought. Blondet is driving a hearse to his own suicide;
Blondet, forsooth! who manufactures newspaper accounts of the last
words of all the great men that die without saying anything!"
"Come, get on," put in Finot.
"It was my intention to explain to you in what the happiness of a man
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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 Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: seem, the pupil is still unconvinced by the arguments of the
master.' I do not know about the antagonistic forces in the Doric
order; in Fleeming they were plain enough; and the Bobadil of these
affairs with Dr. Bell was still, like the corrector of Italian
consuls, 'a great child in everything but information.' At the
house of Colonel Cleather, he might be seen with a family of
children; and with these, there was no word of the Greek orders;
with these Fleeming was only an uproarious boy and an entertaining
draughtsman; so that his coming was the signal for the young people
to troop into the playroom, where sometimes the roof rang with
romping, and sometimes they gathered quietly about him as he amused
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