| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Maid Marian by Thomas Love Peacock: The bridegroom was richly apparelled, and came slowly and
painfully forward, hobbling and leering, and pursing up his mouth
into a smile of resolute defiance to the gout, and of tender
complacency towards his lady love, who, shining like gold at the old
knight's expense, followed slowly between her father and mother,
her cheeks pale, her head drooping, her steps faltering,
and her eyes reddened with tears.
Robin stopped his minstrelsy, and said to the bishop, "This seems
to me an unfit match."
"What do you say, rascal?" said the old knight, hobbling up to him.
"I say," said Robin, "this seems to me an unfit match.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain: ceed: I sat in the private box set apart for me as the
king's minister. While Sir Dinadan was waiting for
his turn to enter the lists, he came in there and sat
down and began to talk; for he was always making up
to me, because I was a stranger and he liked to have a
fresh market for his jokes, the most of them having
reached that stage of wear where the teller has to do
the laughing himself while the other person looks sick.
I had always responded to his efforts as well as I
could, and felt a very deep and real kindness for him,
too, for the reason that if by malice of fate he knew
A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court |
