| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Yates Pride by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman: grove of evergreen trees as white and perfect as in its youth.
The windows showed rich slants of draperies behind their green
glister of old glass.
A gardener, with a boy assistant, was at work in the grounds when
Eudora entered. He touched his cap. He was an old man who had
lived with the Lancasters ever since Eudora could remember. He
advanced toward her now. "Sha'n't Tommy push--the baby-carriage
up to the house for you, Miss Eudora?" he said, in his cracked
old voice.
Eudora flushed slightly, and, as if in response, the old man
flushed, also. "No, I thank you, Wilson," she said, and moved on.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Glaucus/The Wonders of the Shore by Charles Kingsley: names of none. For first, they happily need no advertisement from
me; and next, I fear to be unjust to any one of them by
inadvertently omitting its name. Let me add, that in the
advertising columns of those serials, will be found notices of all
the new manuals, and of all apparatus, and other matters, needed by
amateur naturalists, and of many who are more than amateurs.
Microscopy, meanwhile, and the whole study of "The Wonders of the
Little," have made vast strides in the last twenty years; and I was
equally surprised and pleased, to find, three years ago, in each of
two towns of a few thousand inhabitants, perhaps a dozen good
microscopes, all but hidden away from the public, worked by men who
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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 Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilievich Gogol: become crooked in soul. It is all done to provide wives--yes, may the
pit swallow them up!--with fal-lals. And for what purpose? That some
woman may not have to reproach her husband with the fact that, say,
the Postmaster's wife is wearing a better dress than she is--a dress
which has cost a thousand roubles! 'Balls and gaiety, balls and
gaiety' is the constant cry. Yet what folly balls are! They do not
consort with the Russian spirit and genius, and the devil only knows
why we have them. A grown, middle-aged man--a man dressed in black,
and looking as stiff as a poker--suddenly takes the floor and begins
shuffling his feet about, while another man, even though conversing
with a companion on important business, will, the while, keep capering
Dead Souls |
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 Study of a Woman by Honore de Balzac: laugh; by which Joseph perceived that the blame was not on him.
Now, there are certain morals to this tale on which young men had
better reflect. FIRST MISTAKE: Eugene thought it would be amusing to
make Madame de Listomere laugh at the blunder which had made her the
recipient of a love-letter which was not intended for her. SECOND
MISTAKE: he did not call on Madame de Listomere for several days after
the adventure, thus allowing the thoughts of that virtuous young woman
to crystallize. There were other mistakes which I will here pass over
in silence, in order to give the ladies the pleasure of deducing them,
"ex professo," to those who are unable to guess them.
Eugene at last went to call upon the marquise; but, on attempting to
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