| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Girl with the Golden Eyes by Honore de Balzac: mulatto cast a glance at Henri, so horribly significant, that, for the
first time in his life, the young man, to whom no one denied the gift
of rare courage, trembled. "/If you do not love her well, if you give
her the least pain, I will kill you/." such was the sense of that
brief gaze. De Marsay was escorted, with a care almost obsequious,
along the dimly lit corridor, at the end of which he issued by a
secret door into the garden of the Hotel San-Real. The mulatto made
him walk cautiously through an avenue of lime trees, which led to a
little gate opening upon a street which was at that hour deserted. De
Marsay took a keen notice of everything. The carriage awaited him.
This time the mulatto did not accompany him, and at the moment when
The Girl with the Golden Eyes |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: slip away as if nothing held them. Men begin to look queer; the
circle of quidnuncs make sage remarks. Once more - no use. I
begin to know I ought to feel sheepish and beat, but somehow I feel
cocky instead. I laugh and say, "Well, I am bound to break
something down" - and suddenly see. "Oho, there's the place; get
weight on there, and the belt won't slip." With much labour, on go
the belts again. "Now then, a spar thro' there and six men's
weight on; mind you're not carried away." - "Ay, ay, sir." But
evidently no one believes in the plan. "Hurrah, round she goes -
stick to your spar. All right, shut off steam." And the
difficulty is vanquished.
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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 Sylvie and Bruno by Lewis Carroll: He kissed her cheek, he pressed her hand,
Yet still she glanced aside.
'Too gay he seems,' she darkly dreams,
'Too gallant and too gay
To think of me--poor simple me---
When he is far away!'
'I bring my Love this goodly pearl
Across the seas,' he said:
'A gem to deck the dearest girl
That ever sailor wed!'
She clasps it tight' her eyes are bright:
Sylvie and Bruno |
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 A House of Pomegranates by Oscar Wilde: was so affected that he could not help saying to Don Pedro that it
seemed to him intolerable that things made simply out of wood and
coloured wax, and worked mechanically by wires, should be so
unhappy and meet with such terrible misfortunes.
An African juggler followed, who brought in a large flat basket
covered with a red cloth, and having placed it in the centre of the
arena, he took from his turban a curious reed pipe, and blew
through it. In a few moments the cloth began to move, and as the
pipe grew shriller and shriller two green and gold snakes put out
their strange wedge-shaped heads and rose slowly up, swaying to and
fro with the music as a plant sways in the water. The children,
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