| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Ball at Sceaux by Honore de Balzac: gallantry was held in honor, not to guess at once that by the merest
chance Emilie had met the Unknown of the Sceaux gardens. In spite of
the film which age had drawn over his gray eyes, the Comte de
Kergarouet could recognize the signs of extreme agitation in his
niece, under the unmoved expression she tried to give to her features.
The girl's piercing eyes were fixed in a sort of dull amazement on the
stranger, who quietly walked on in front of her.
"Ay, that's it," thought the sailor. "She is following him as a pirate
follows a merchantman. Then, when she has lost sight of him, she will
be in despair at not knowing who it is she is in love with, and
whether he is a marquis or a shopkeeper. Really these young heads need
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Historical Lecturers and Essays by Charles Kingsley: but went on to the East.
He never occupied that chair; wrecked upon the Isle of Zante, as he
was sailing back from Palestine, he died miserably of fever and
want, as thousands of pilgrims returning from the Holy Land had died
before him. A goldsmith recognised him; buried him in a chapel of
the Virgin; and put up over him a simple stone, which remained till
late years; and may remain, for aught I know, even now.
So perished, in the prime of life, "a martyr to his love of
science," to quote the words of M. Burggraeve of Ghent, his able
biographer and commentator, "the prodigious man, who created a
science at an epoch when everything was still an obstacle to his
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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 Pellucidar by Edgar Rice Burroughs: its secret from it.
In addition to our native servants, we took along
an English telegraph-operator named Frank Downes.
Nothing of interest enlivened our journey by rail and
caravan till we came to the cluster of date-palms about
the ancient well upon the rim of the Sahara.
It was the very spot at which I first had seen David
Innes. If he had ever raised a cairn above the telegraph
instrument no sign of it remained now. Had it not been
for the chance that caused Cogdon Nestor to throw
down his sleeping rug directly over the hidden instru-
Pellucidar |
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 Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie: evidence.
The preliminaries were gone through. The jury viewed the body,
and John Cavendish gave evidence of identification.
Further questioned, he described his awakening in the early hours
of the morning, and the circumstances of his mother's death.
The medical evidence was next taken. There was a breathless
hush, and every eye was fixed on the famous London specialist,
who was known to be one of the greatest authorities of the day on
the subject of toxicology.
In a few brief words, he summed up the result of the post-mortem.
Shorn of its medical phraseology and technicalities, it amounted
The Mysterious Affair at Styles |
