| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from 1492 by Mary Johntson: a voyage of his own to that Southern Continent
that never had the Admiral chance to return to! The Sovereigns
now were giving such consent to this one and to that
one, breaking their pact with Christopherus Columbus. In
our world it was now impossible that that pact should be
letter-kept, but the Genoese did not see it so. Ojeda sailed
from Cadiz for Paria with four ships and a concourse of
adventurers. With him went the pilot Juan de la Cosa,
and a geographer of Florence, Messer Amerigo Vespucci.
It came to us in Hispaniola that Ojeda was gone. Now
I saw the Admiral's heart begin to break. Yet Ojeda in
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Patchwork Girl of Oz by L. Frank Baum: determined voice, and advanced a few steps toward
the giant porcupine. Pausing to look back, it
asked: "All ready?"
"All ready!" they answered.
"Then cover up your ears and brace yourselves
firmly. Now, then--look out!"
The Woozy turned toward Chiss, opened wide its
mouth and said:
"Quee-ee-ee-eek."
"Go ahead and growl," said Scraps.
"Why, I--I did growl!" retorted the Woozy,
The Patchwork Girl of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Where There's A Will by Mary Roberts Rinehart: Doctor Barnes beside me, steadying me by the arm. I only spoke
once that I remember and that was just as we got to the house,
"This settles it!" I panted, desperately. "It's all over."
"Not a bit of it!" he said, shoving me up the steps and into the
hall. "The old teakettle is just getting `het up' a bit. By the
gods and little fishes, just listen to it singing down there!"
The help was gathered in a crowd at the head of the bath-house
staircase, where a cloud of steam was coming up, and down below
we could hear furious talking, and somebody shouting, "Mike!
Mike!" in a voice that was choked with rage and steam.
Doctor Barnes elbowed his way through the crowd to the top of the
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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 Westward Ho! by Charles Kingsley: instigation of the devil and of that lady. For as we were about to
go ashore, I, going down into the cabin of the prize, saw Mr.
Oxenham and that lady making great cheer of each other with, 'My
life,' and 'My king,' and 'Light of my eyes,' and such toys; and
being bidden by Mr. Oxenham to fetch out the lady's mails, and take
them ashore, heard how the two laughed together about the old ape
of Panama (which ape, or devil rather, I saw afterwards to my
cost), and also how she said that she had been dead for five years,
and now that Mr. Oxenham was come, she was alive again, and so
forth.
"Mr. Oxenham bade take the little maid ashore, kissing her and
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