| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Cousin Pons by Honore de Balzac: only was his name still remembered there, but he had kept up a
correspondence with Mantes. Camusot's immediate successor, the judge
with whom he had been most intimate during his term of office, was
still President of the Tribunal, and consequently knew all about
Fraisier.
"Do you know, madame," Fraisier said, when at last the red sluices of
La Cibot's torrent tongue were closed, "do you know that your
principal enemy will be a man who can send you to the scaffold?"
The portress started on her chair, making a sudden spring like a jack-
in-the-box.
"Calm yourself, dear madame," continued Fraisier. "You may not have
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Before Adam by Jack London: the horde. Then there was the Swift One, whom I had
not forgotten.
At any rate, during the period of Lop-Ear's marriage I
knocked about from pillar to post, in danger every
night that I slept, and never comfortable. One of the
Folk died, and his widow was taken into the cave of
another one of the Folk. I took possession of the
abandoned cave, but it was wide-mouthed, and after
Red-Eye nearly trapped me in it one day, I returned to
sleeping in the passage of the double-cave. During the
summer, however, I used to stay away from the caves for
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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 Tom Sawyer Abroad by Mark Twain: is talking uncommon fine and thinks the other person
is admiring, and that other person goes to sleep that
way. Of course he oughtn't to go to sleep, because
it's shabby; but the finer a person talks the certainer
it is to make you sleep, and so when you come to look
at it it ain't nobody's fault in particular; both of
them's to blame.
Jim begun to snore -- soft and blubbery at first,
then a long rasp, then a stronger one, then a half a
dozen horrible ones like the last water sucking down
the plug-hole of a bath-tub, then the same with more
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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 The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton: the rest of them, that I must hold out and cut off her
allowance, till she was made to see that it was her duty
to go back to Olenski. They thought they'd convinced
me when the secretary, or whatever he was, came out
with the last proposals: handsome proposals I confess
they were. After all, marriage is marriage, and money's
money--both useful things in their way . . . and I didn't
know what to answer--" She broke off and drew a
long breath, as if speaking had become an effort. "But
the minute I laid eyes on her, I said: `You sweet bird,
you! Shut you up in that cage again? Never!' And now
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