| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Muse of the Department by Honore de Balzac: surgeon and the three officers went down suspecting mischief. The
stranger could only say, 'Be on your guard--' when she dropped down
dead. It was the waiting-woman, who, finding she had been poisoned,
had hoped to arrive in time to warn her lover.
" 'Devil take it!' cried Captain Falcon, 'that is what I call love! No
woman on earth but a Spaniard can run about with a dose of poison in
her inside!'
"Bega remained strangely pensive. To drown the dark presentiments that
haunted him, he sat down to table again, and with his companions drank
immoderately. The whole party went early to bed, half drunk.
"In the middle of the night the hapless Bega was aroused by the sharp
The Muse of the Department |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from An Unsocial Socialist by George Bernard Shaw: by governments for lump sums, not reinvestable, or what not. Our
capitalist community is then thrown on the remains of the last
dividend, which it consumes long before it can rehabilitate its
extinct machinery of production in order to support itself with
its own hands. Horses, dogs, cats, rats, blackberries, mushrooms,
and cannibalism only postpone--"
"Ha! ha! ha!" shouted Sir Charles. "On my honor, I thought you
were serious at first, Trefusis. Come, confess, old chap; it's
all a fad of yours. I half suspected you of being a bit of a
crank." And he winked at Erskine.
"What I have described to you is the inevitable outcome of our
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: according, no doubt, to the exterior ornamentation.
"Here is your lodging," said Cornelius; "it is plain and solid and
contains all that is needed for sleep. Good night! Do not leave this
room as THE OTHERS did."
After giving his apprentice a last look full of many meanings,
Cornelius double-locked the door, took away the key and descended the
staircase, leaving the young nobleman as much befooled as a bell-
founder when on opening his mould he finds nothing. Alone, without
light, seated on a stool, in a little garret from which so many of his
predecessors had gone to the scaffold, the young fellow felt like a
wild beast caught in a trap. He jumped upon the stool and raised
|
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 Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare: PETRUCHIO.
I hope, better.
HORTENSIO.
Sirrah Biondello, go and entreat my wife
To come to me forthwith.
[Exit BIONDELLO.]
PETRUCHIO.
O, ho! entreat her!
Nay, then she must needs come.
HORTENSIO.
I am afraid, sir,
The Taming of the Shrew |
