| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain: than the multiplication of avenues of escape.
In the foregoing statement the attempt has been made to condense
in as limited a space as the importance of the subject would permit,
the general elements of the problem, and the general features
of the proposed method of improvement which has been adopted
by the Mississippi River Commission.
The writer cannot help feeling that it is somewhat presumptuous on
his part to attempt to present the facts relating to an enterprise
which calls for the highest scientific skill; but it is a matter
which interests every citizen of the United States, and is one
of the methods of reconstruction which ought to be approved.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Polly of the Circus by Margaret Mayo: laced in the cold, dark mornings, and the strings that were
always snapping.
Something had gone.
They were not philosophers to reason like Emerson, that for
everything we lose we gain something; they were simple souls,
these two, they could only feel.
Chapter II
WHILE Polly sat in the dressing tent, listening indifferently to
the chatter about the "Leap of Death" girl, Jim waited in the lot
outside, opening and shutting a small, leather bag which he had
bought for her that day. He was as blind to the picturesque
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