| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Market-Place by Harold Frederic: come to London, that things had turned out as they had.
In truth, he stood now for the first time on solid ground.
When he thought of it, now, the risk he had been running
all these months gave him a little sinking of the heart.
Upon reflection, the performance of having sold the same
property first to Tavender in Mexico and then to the
Rubber Consols Company in London might be subject to
injurious comment, or worse. The fact that it was not a
real property to begin with had no place in his thoughts.
It was a concession--and concessions were immemorially
worth what they would fetch. But the other thing might
The Market-Place |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: vague, fond thoughts; it was like a vision of the dreamed-of bliss of
a better world. And the three, so attuned to each other, lived in
truth such a life as one might picture for them at first sight--the
ordered, simple, and regular life best suited for a child's education.
Both children rose an hour after daybreak and repeated a short prayer,
a habit learned in their babyhood. For seven years the sincere
petition had been put up every morning on their mother's bed, and
begun and ended by a kiss. Then the two brothers went through their
morning toilet as scrupulously as any pretty woman; doubtless they had
been trained in habits of minute attention to the person, so necessary
to health of body and mind, habits in some sort conducive to a sense
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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 Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: is most sacred in life--of cigars! I am no professor of social economy
for the instruction of fools. Let us breakfast! It costs less to give
you a tunny omelette than to lavish the resources of my brain on you."
"Do you bargain with your friends?"
"My dear fellow," said Henri, who rarely denied himself a sarcasm,
"since all the same, you may some day need, like anybody else, to use
discretion, and since I have much love for you--yes, I like you! Upon
my word, if you only wanted a thousand-franc note to keep you from
blowing your brains out, you would find it here, for we haven't yet
done any business of that sort, eh, Paul? If you had to fight
to-morrow, I would measure the ground and load the pistols, so that
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
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 Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: historical documents, but hides her actions, especially the laying,
which I estimate approximately to take place in October. The sum
total of the eggs is divided into five or six small, flat,
lentiform pockets, which, taken together, occupy the greater part
of the maternal home. These capsules have each their own
partition-wall of superb white satin, but they are so closely
soldered, both together and to the floor of the house, that it is
impossible to part them without tearing them, impossible,
therefore, to obtain them separately. The eggs in all amount to
about a hundred.
The mother sits upon the heap of pockets with the same devotion as
The Life of the Spider |
