| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from An Historical Mystery by Honore de Balzac: then took him to the breach in the moat and showed him the sunken way.
"We have guessed the trick," said Peyrade.
"And I'll tell you how it was done," added Corentin. "That little
scamp and the girl decoyed those idiots of gendarmes and thus made
time for the game to escape."
"We can't know the truth till daylight," said Peyrade. "The road is
damp; I have ordered two gendarmes to barricade it top and bottom.
We'll examine it after daylight, and find out by the footsteps who
went that way."
"I see a hoof-mark," said Corentin; "let us go to the stables."
"How many horses do you keep?" said Peyrade, returning to the salon
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: AUTO-DA-FE, in which nearly three hundred heretics, amongst whom
were many Englishmen, had been delivered over to the secular arm to
be burned.
Certainly he had loved her madly, and to the ruin, many thought, of
his country, then at war with England for the possession of the
empire of the New World. He had hardly ever permitted her to be
out of his sight; for her, he had forgotten, or seemed to have
forgotten, all grave affairs of State; and, with that terrible
blindness that passion brings upon its servants, he had failed to
notice that the elaborate ceremonies by which he sought to please
her did but aggravate the strange malady from which she suffered.
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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 Early Short Fiction of Edith Wharton by Edith Wharton: smiled.
"Yes: that's what I'm here for--to rest. And I've taken the
opportunity to write out a clearer statement--"
Granice's hand shook so that he could hardly draw the folded
paper from his pocket. As he did so he noticed that the reporter
was accompanied by a tall man with grave compassionate eyes. It
came to Granice in a wild thrill of conviction that this was the
face he had waited for. . .
"Perhaps your friend--he IS your friend?--would glance over it--
or I could put the case in a few words if you have time?"
Granice's voice shook like his hand. If this chance escaped him
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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 Master of Ballantrae by Robert Louis Stevenson: be seen with you in familiar correspondence) that every acre is
mine before God Almighty - and every doit of the money you withhold
from me, you do it as a thief, a perjurer, and a disloyal brother!"
"General Clinton," I cried, "do not listen to his lies. I am the
steward of the estate, and there is not one word of truth in it.
The man is a forfeited rebel turned into a hired spy: there is his
story in two words."
It was thus that (in the heat of the moment) I let slip his infamy.
"Fellow," said the Governor, turning his face sternly on the
Master, "I know more of you than you think for. We have some
broken ends of your adventures in the provinces, which you will do
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