| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Voyage Out by Virginia Woolf: and the beach of the island was unmarked, save by the skeleton
print of birds' feet. The branches of the trees on the bank looked
more twisted and angular than ever, and the green of the leaves
was lurid and splashed with gold. Then Hirst began to talk,
leaning over the bow.
"It makes one awfully queer, don't you find?" he complained.
"These trees get on one's nerves--it's all so crazy.
God's undoubtedly mad. What sane person could have conceived
a wilderness like this, and peopled it with apes and alligators?
I should go mad if I lived here--raving mad."
Terence attempted to answer him, but Mrs. Ambrose replied instead.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Coxon Fund by Henry James: little impatience, as I replied: "The exhibition of a splendid
intellect." My young lady looked not quite satisfied at this, but
as I wasn't prepared for another question I hastily pursued: "The
sight of a great suspended swinging crystal--huge lucid lustrous, a
block of light--flashing back every impression of life and every
possibility of thought!"
This gave her something to turn over till we had passed out to the
dusky porch of the hall, in front of which the lamps of a quiet
brougham were almost the only thing Saltram's treachery hadn't
extinguished. I went with her to the door of her carriage, out of
which she leaned a moment after she had thanked me and taken her
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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 Eugenie Grandet by Honore de Balzac: "I feel better!" said Eugenie after a moment.
This nervous excitement in a nature hitherto, to all appearance, calm
and cold, reacted on Madame Grandet; she looked at her daughter with
the sympathetic intuition with which mothers are gifted for the
objects of their tenderness, and guessed all. In truth the life of the
Hungarian sisters, bound together by a freak of nature, could scarcely
have been more intimate than that of Eugenie and her mother,--always
together in the embrasure of that window, and sleeping together in the
same atmosphere.
"My poor child!" said Madame Grandet, taking Eugenie's head and laying
it upon her bosom.
Eugenie Grandet |
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 Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: the houses, or about the people, strikes me with an unexpected
unfamiliarity: I walk among surprises, for just where you think
you have them, something wrong turns up.
I got a little Law read yesterday, and some German this morning,
but on the whole there are too many amusements going for much work;
as for correspondence, I have neither heart nor time for it to-day.
R. L. S.
Letter: TO MRS. SITWELL
17 HERIOT ROW, EDINBURGH, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 1873.
I HAVE been to-day a very long walk with my father through some of
the most beautiful ways hereabouts; the day was cold with an iron,
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