The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Catriona by Robert Louis Stevenson: feet and stood waiting her in a drunkenness of hope.
I gave her "good morning" as she came up, which she returned with a
good deal of composure.
"Will you forgive my having followed you?" said I.
"I know you are always meaning kindly," she replied; and then, with a
little outburst, "but why will you be sending money to that man! It
must not be."
"I never sent it for him," said I, "but for you, as you know well."
"And you have no right to be sending it to either one of us," she said.
"David, it is not right."
"It is not, it is all wrong," said I, "and I pray God he will help this
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Maitre Cornelius by Honore de Balzac: instructions--to a lieutenant of the Scottish guard to take a squad of
men and accompany the ambassador to Venice. Saint-Vallier departed in
haste, after giving his wife a cold kiss which he would fain have made
deadly. Louis XI. then crossed over to the Malemaison, eager to begin
the unravelling of the melancholy comedy, lasting now for eight years,
in the house of his silversmith; flattering himself that, in his
quality of king, he had enough penetration to discover the secret of
the robberies. Cornelius did not see the arrival of the escort of his
royal master without uneasiness.
"Are all those persons to take part in the inquiry?" he said to the
king.
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