| 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: The formalities of this final transfer of shares had been
dictated to the former, and he had gone off on the business,
before the Broker arrived.
Thorpe stood waiting near the door, and held out his hand
with a dramatically significant gesture when the little
Scotchman entered. "Put her there!" he exclaimed heartily,
with an exuberant reversion to the slang of remote
transatlantic bonhomie.
"Yeh've done it, then!" said Semple, his sharp face
softening with pleasure at the news. "Yeh've pulled
it off at twenty-three!"
The Market-Place |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: of this Ricks on it. It was a Chicago paper, and it had obloquies of
Ricks in every paragraph. By reading it over I harvested the
intelligence that said alleged Ricks had laid off all that portion of
the State of Florida that lies under water into town lots and sold 'em
to alleged innocent investors from his magnificently furnished offices
in Chicago. After he had taken in a hundred thousand or so dollars one
of these fussy purchasers that are always making trouble (I've had 'em
actually try gold watches I've sold 'em with acid) took a cheap
excursion down to the land where it is always just before supper to
look at his lot and see if it didn't need a new paling or two on the
fence, and market a few lemons in time for the Christmas present
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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 Troll Garden and Selected Stories by Willa Cather: By this time Imogen had made out that here the plural
pronoun, third person, always referred to the artists. As
Hamilton's manner did not spur one to cordial intercourse, and as
his attention seemed directed to Miss Broadwood, insofar as it
could be said to be directed to anyone, she sat down facing the
conservatory and watched him, unable to decide in how far he was
identical with the man who had first met Flavia Malcolm in her
mother's house, twelve years ago. Did he at all remember having
known her as a little girl, and why did his indifference hurt her
so, after all these years? Had some remnant of her childish
affection for him gone on living, somewhere down in the sealed
The Troll Garden and Selected Stories |
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 Little Britain by Washington Irving: minds of his auditors with stuffed sea-monsters, bottled
serpents, and his own visage, which is a title-page of
tribulation, they have spread great gloom through the minds of
the people of Little Britain. They shake their heads whenever
they go by Bow Church, and observe, that they never expected
any good to come of taking down that steeple, which in old
times told nothing but glad tidings, as the history of
Whittington and his Cat bears witness.
The rival oracle of Little Britain is a substantial
cheesemonger, who lives in a fragment of one of the old family
mansions, and is as magnificently lodged as a round-bellied
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