| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Michael Strogoff by Jules Verne: satisfied them that they stood well in the good graces of their
chief.
At least so thought Harry Blount and Alcide Jolivet, the
two inseparables, now associated together in the chase after
news. After leaving Zabediero, they had proceeded rapidly
to Tomsk. The plan they had agreed upon was to leave the
Tartars as soon as possible, and to join a Russian regiment,
and, if they could, to go with them to Irkutsk. All that they
had seen of the invasion, its burnings, its pillages, its
murders, had perfectly sickened them, and they longed to be
among the ranks of the Siberian army. Jolivet had told his
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Wyoming by William MacLeod Raine: way y'u like. Instead of having shot up a casual idiot, I've
killed Ned Bannister's right-hand man. That will be the
excuse--shooting Morgan. But the real trouble is that I won the
championship belt from your cousin. He already hated y'u like
poison, and he don't love me any too hard. He will have us
arrested by his sheriff here. Catch the point. Y'U'RE NED
BANNISTER, THE OUTLAW, AND I'M HIS RIGHT-BOWER. That's the play
he's going to make, and he's going to make it right soon."
"I don't care if he does. We'll fight him on his own ground.
We'll prove that he's the miscreant and not us."
"Prove nothing," snarled McWilliams. "Do y'u reckon he'll give us
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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 Fisherman's Luck by Henry van Dyke: step which costs" is accomplished. The tiny black and orange hackle
goes curling out over the stream, lights softly, and swings around
with the current, folding and expanding its feathers as if it were
alive. The big trout takes it promptly the instant it passes over
him; and I play him and net him without moving from my perilous
perch.
Graygown waves her crochet-work like a flag, "Bravo!" she cries.
"That's a beauty, nearly two pounds! But do be careful about coming
back; you are not good enough to take any risks yet."
The station at Skogstad is a solitary farmhouse lying far up on the
bare hillside, with its barns and out-buildings grouped around a
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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 The Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: they become adhesive by taking the glaze of the gummy moisture
wherewith they are filled.
In short, the spiral thread is a capillary tube finer than any that
our physics will ever know. It is rolled into a twist so as to
possess an elasticity that allows it, without breaking, to yield to
the tugs of the captured prey; it holds a supply of sticky matter
in reserve in its tube, so as to renew the adhesive properties of
the surface by incessant exudation, as they become impaired by
exposure to the air. It is simply marvellous.
The Epeira hunts not with springs, but with lime-snares. And such
lime-snares! Everything is caught in them, down to the dandelion-
The Life of the Spider |
