| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain: too dark to see yet, so we made the canoe fast and set
in her to wait for daylight.
The light begun to come before we got to the foot
of the island. Then we looked in at the window. We
could make out a bed, and a table, and two old chairs,
and lots of things around about on the floor, and there
was clothes hanging against the wall. There was
something laying on the floor in the far corner that
looked like a man. So Jim says:
"Hello, you!"
But it didn't budge. So I hollered again, and then
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Witch, et. al by Anton Chekhov: portmanteau in his hand and a driver. The latter was smoking a
short pipe; the light of the pipe moved about in the darkness,
dying away and flaring up again; for an instant it lighted up a
bit of a sleeve, then a shaggy moustache and big copper-red nose,
then stern-looking, overhanging eyebrows. The postman pressed
down the mail bags with his hands, laid his sword on them and
jumped into the cart. The student clambered irresolutely in after
him, and accidentally touching him with his elbow, said timidly
and politely: "I beg your pardon."
The pipe went out. The postmaster came out of the post-office
just as he was, in his waistcoat and slippers; shrinking from the
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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 Ursula by Honore de Balzac: garrison. But as there were two men to each instrument it was
impossible to find out which of them had gone to Nemours. The colonel
forbade them to play for any private person in future without his
permission. Savinien had an interview with the procureur du roi,
Ursula's legal guardian, and explained to him the injury these scenes
would do to a young girl naturally so delicate and sensitive, begging
him to take some action to discover the author of such wrong.
Three nights later three violins, a flute, a guitar, and a hautboy
began another serenade. This time the musicians fled towards
Montargis, where there happened then to be a company of comic actors.
A loud and ringing voice called out as they left: "To the daughter of
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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 In the South Seas by Robert Louis Stevenson: traits of a new world. I read in a pamphlet (I will not give the
author's name) that the Marquesan especially resembles the
Paumotuan. I should take the two races, though so near in
neighbourhood, to be extremes of Polynesian diversity. The
Marquesan is certainly the most beautiful of human races, and one
of the tallest - the Paumotuan averaging a good inch shorter, and
not even handsome; the Marquesan open-handed, inert, insensible to
religion, childishly self-indulgent - the Paumotuan greedy, hardy,
enterprising, a religious disputant, and with a trace of the
ascetic character.
Yet a few years ago, and the people of the archipelago were crafty
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