| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Distinguished Provincial at Paris by Honore de Balzac: that time, in strong contrast with the glistening leather. The color
of that seam had tinged his thoughts during a previous conversation
with himself, as he sought to explain the presence of a mysterious
pair of hessians in Coralie's fender. He remembered now that he had
seen the name of "Gay, Rue de la Michodiere," printed in black letters
on the soft white kid lining.
"You have a handsome pair of boots, sir," he said.
"Like everything else about him," said Coralie.
"I should be very glad of your bootmaker's address."
"Oh, how like the Rue des Bourdonnais to ask for a tradesman's
address," cried Coralie. "Do YOU intend to patronize a young man's
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Bucolics by Virgil: In singing with the swan: let Tityrus
Be Orpheus, Orpheus in the forest-glade,
Arion 'mid his dolphins on the deep.
"Begin, my flute, with me Maenalian lays.
Yea, be the whole earth to mid-ocean turned!
Farewell, ye woodlands I from the tall peak
Of yon aerial rock will headlong plunge
Into the billows: this my latest gift,
From dying lips bequeathed thee, see thou keep.
Cease now, my flute, now cease Maenalian lays."
Thus Damon: but do ye, Pierian Maids-
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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 Main Street by Sinclair Lewis: Mrs. Bogart did not rage in return. Suddenly she was
hopeless. Her head drooped. She patted her black kid gloves,
picked at a thread of her faded brown skirt, and sighed, "He's
a good boy, and awful affectionate if you treat him right.
Some thinks he's terrible wild, but that's because he's young.
And he's so brave and truthful--why, he was one of the first
in town that wanted to enlist for the war, and I had to speak
real sharp to him to keep him from running away. I didn't
want him to get into no bad influences round these camps--
and then," Mrs. Bogart rose from her pitifulness, recovered her
pace, "then I go and bring into my own house a woman that's
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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 Poems by Oscar Wilde: And the mighty nations would have crowned
me, who am crownless now and without name,
And some orient dawn had found me kneeling
on the threshold of the House of Fame.
I had sat within that marble circle where the
oldest bard is as the young,
And the pipe is ever dropping honey, and the
lyre's strings are ever strung.
Keats had lifted up his hymeneal curls from out
the poppy-seeded wine,
With ambrosial mouth had kissed my forehead,
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