| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: apple an emblem. He had intended, after it had been divided and eaten,
to create diversion by sticking the seeds against his forehead and
naming them for young ladies of his acquaintance. One he was going to
name Mrs. McFarland. The seed that fell off first would be--but 'twas
too late now.
"The apple," continued Judge Menefee, charging his jury, "in modern
days occupies, though undeservedly, a lowly place in our esteem.
Indeed, it is so constantly associated with the culinary and the
commercial that it is hardly to be classed among the polite fruits.
But in ancient times this was not so. Biblical, historical, and
mythological lore abounds with evidences that the apple was the
Heart of the West |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Pierre Grassou by Honore de Balzac: haired women, and he turned Roman, etc. After two years of marriage
what man would ever care about the color of his wife's hair? Beauty
fades,--but ugliness remains! Money is one-half of all happiness. That
night when he went to bed the painter had come to think Virginie
Vervelle charming.
When the three Vervelles arrived on the day of the second sitting the
artist received them with smiles. The rascal had shaved and put on
clean linen; he had also arranged his hair in a pleasing manner, and
chosen a very becoming pair of trousers and red leather slippers with
pointed toes. The family replied with smiles as flattering as those of
the artist. Virginie became the color of her hair, lowered her eyes,
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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 Tales and Fantasies by Robert Louis Stevenson: and doorway; and the great London physician, in order to
escape, would be forced to step to one side. It was plain
that he hesitated before the thought of this humiliation.
White as he was, there was a dangerous glitter in his
spectacles; but while he still paused uncertain, he became
aware that the driver of his fly was peering in from the
street at this unusual scene and caught a glimpse at the same
time of our little body from the parlour, huddled by the
corner of the bar. The presence of so many witnesses decided
him at once to flee. He crouched together, brushing on the
wainscot, and made a dart like a serpent, striking for the
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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 Glasses by Henry James: apparition. On the following, with an equal incoherence, a
sacrifice even of his bewildered sisters, whom he left behind, he
made an heroic effort to escape by flight from a fate of which he
had already felt the cold breath. That fate, in London, very
little later, drove him straight before it--drove him one Sunday
afternoon, in the rain, to the door of the Hammond Synges. He
marched in other words close up to the cannon that was to blow him
to pieces. But three weeks, when he reappeared to me, had elapsed
since then, yet (to vary my metaphor) the burden he was to carry
for the rest of his days was firmly lashed to his back. I don't
mean by this that Flora had been persuaded to contract her scope; I
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