| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Firm of Nucingen by Honore de Balzac: every one else was gone, and say, 'Give me your shoe!' and Isaure
would put her little foot on a chair and take it off and give it to
him, with a glance, one of those glances that--in short, you
understand.
"At length Godefroid discovered a great mystery in Malvina. Whenever
du Tillet knocked at the door, the live red that colored Malvina's
face said 'Ferdinand!' When the poor girl's eyes fell on that two-
footed tiger, they lighted up like a brazier fanned by a current of
air. When Ferdinand drew her away to the window or a side table, she
betrayed her secret infinite joy. It is a rare and wonderful thing to
see a woman so much in love that she loses her cunning to be strange,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Scenes from a Courtesan's Life by Honore de Balzac: grateful to him. Peyrade, who had sent for his child from Antwerp, now
found himself without employment in Paris and with no means beyond a
pension of twelve hundred francs a year allowed him by the Police
Department as Lenoir's old disciple. He took lodgings in the Rue des
Moineaux on the fourth floor, five little rooms, at a rent of two
hundred and fifty francs.
If any man should be aware of the uses and sweets of friendship, is it
not the moral leper known to the world as a spy, to the mob as a
mouchard, to the department as an "agent"? Peyrade and Corentin were
such friends as Orestes and Pylades. Peyrade had trained Corentin as
Vien trained David; but the pupil soon surpassed his master. They had
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