| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Vision Splendid by William MacLeod Raine: Before they could get in sail and make secure the sheets ripped
with a scream, braces parted and the topmasts snapped off. The
_Nancy_ went pitching forward into the yawning deeps with drunken
plunges from which it seemed she would never emerge. Great combing
seas toppled down and pounded the decks, while the sailors clung
to stays or whatever would give them a hold.
The squall lasted scarce an hour, but it left the schooner
dismantled. Her sheets were in ribbons, her topmasts and bowsprit
gone. There was nothing for it but a crippled beat toward the
Islands.
Four days later she made an offing in the harbor at Honolulu just
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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 Marriage Contract by Honore de Balzac: of the Gate Guards, and lived till 1813, having by great good luck
escaped the dangers of the Revolution in the following manner.
Toward the close of the year, 1790, he went to Martinque, where his
wife had interests, leaving the management of his property in Gascogne
to an honest man, a notary's clerk, named Mathias, who was inclined to
--or at any rate did--give into the new ideas. On his return the Comte
de Manerville found his possessions intact and well-managed. This
sound result was the fruit produced by grafting the Gascon on the
Norman.
Madame de Manerville died in 1810. Having learned the importance of
worldly goods through the dissipations of his youth, and, giving them,
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