| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: lances, which I had organized in the vicinity of Andernach. A few days
before these events I had fallen plump, during the night, into a
French detachment of eight hundred men. We were two hundred at the
most. My scouts had sold me. I was thrown into the prison of
Andernach, and they talked of shooting me, as a warning to intimidate
others. The French talked also of reprisals. My father, however,
obtained a reprieve for three days to give him time to see General
Augereau, whom he knew, and ask for my pardon, which was granted. Thus
it happened that I saw Prosper Magnan when he was brought to the
prison. He inspired me with the profoundest pity. Though pale,
distracted, and covered with blood, his whole countenance had a
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Little Britain by Washington Irving: entirely discarded; there is no such thing as getting up an
honest country dance; and on my attempting to kiss a young
lady under the mistletoe last Christmas, I was indignantly
repulsed; the Miss Lambs having pronounced it "shocking
vulgar." Bitter rivalry has also broken out as to the most
fashionable part of Little Britain; the Lambs standing up for the
dignity of the Cross-Keys Square, and the Trotters for the
vicinity of St. Bartholomew's.
Thus is this little territory torn by factions and internal
dissensions, like the great empire who name it bears; and what
will be the result would puzzle the apothecary himself, with all
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