| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Breaking Point by Mary Roberts Rinehart: amount of whisky from his flask.
"This is all we have," he explained. "We'll have to go slow
with it."
It had an almost immediate effect. The twitching grew less, and a
faint color came into Dick's face. He stood up and stretched
himself. "That's better," he said. "I was all in. I must have
been riding that infernal horse for years."
He wandered about while the reporter made a fire and set the coffee
pot to boil. Bassett, glancing up once, saw him surveying the
ruined lean-to from the doorway, with an expression he could not
understand. But he did not say anything, nor did he speak again
 The Breaking Point |
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 American by Henry James: friendly intonation, "Don't you?"
"I can't say I know it. I know my house--I know my friends--
I don't know Paris."
"Oh, you lose a great deal," said Newman, sympathetically.
Madame de Bellegarde stared; it was presumably the first time
she had been condoled with on her losses.
"I am content with what I have," she said with dignity.
Newman's eyes, at this moment, were wandering round the room,
which struck him as rather sad and shabby; passing from the high casements,
with their small, thickly-framed panes, to the sallow tints of two or
three portraits in pastel, of the last century, which hung between them.
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