| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Brother of Daphne by Dornford Yates: getting into a tram-line, and said I ought to know better than
to talk to the man at the wheel.
"Friend," said I, "I perceive you are a humorist. Lo, here in
this car are already three humorists. Under these unfortunate
circumstances, I have no alternative but to ask you to withdraw."
It was just then that the near hind tyre burst exactly under him.
We gave him half a sovereign towards buying a new bicycle, but I
believe he will always think we did it on purpose.
It had been arranged that we should spend the night at Salisbury
and push on to Cornwall on the following day. We made the
Cathedral city soon after five and slipped out to see Stonehenge.
 The Brother of Daphne |
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 Ten Years Later by Alexandre Dumas: cardinal after the health of his nieces; he regretted, he
said, not having the pleasure of receiving them at the same
time with their uncle; they must certainly have grown in
stature, beauty and grace, as they had promised to do the
last time Monsieur had seen them.
What had first struck the king was a certain contrast in the
voices of the two interlocutors. The voice of Monsieur was
calm and natural while he spoke thus; while that of M. de
Mazarin jumped by a note and a half to reply above the
diapason of his usual voice. It might have been said that he
wished that voice to strike, at the end of the salon, any
 Ten Years Later |