| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mad King by Edgar Rice Burroughs: Peter will never forget it."
"I give you my word, your highness, that I know posi-
tively that if I leave Blentz tonight Prince Peter will not
have Mr. Custer shot in the morning, and it will so greatly
jeopardize his own plans if we attempt to release the prisoner
that in all probability we ourselves will be unable to es-
cape."
She looked at him thoughtfully for a moment.
"You give me your word that he will be safe?" she asked.
"My royal word," he replied.
"Very well, let us leave at once."
The Mad King |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Ivanhoe by Walter Scott: profound gravity; and in the faces of the knights
might be perceived traces of military daring, united
with the solemn carriage becoming men of a religious
profession, and which, in the presence of
their Grand Master, failed not to sit upon every
brow.
The remaining and lower part of the hall was
filled with guards, holding partisans, and with other
attendants whom curiosity had drawn thither, to
see at once a Grand Master and a Jewish sorceress.
By far the greater part of those inferior persons
Ivanhoe |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Travels of Sir John Mandeville by Sir John Mandeville: which isles Ypocras was lord of. And some men say, that in the
isle of Lango is yet the daughter of Ypocras, in form and likeness
of a great dragon, that is a hundred fathom of length, as men say,
for I have not seen her. And they of the isles call her Lady of
the Land. And she lieth in an old castle, in a cave, and sheweth
twice or thrice in the year, and she doth no harm to no man, but if
men do her harm. And she was thus changed and transformed, from a
fair damosel, into likeness of a dragon, by a goddess that was
clept Diana. And men say, that she shall so endure in that form of
a dragon, unto [the] time that a knight come, that is so hardy,
that dare come to her and kiss her on the mouth; and then shall she
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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 Madame Firmiani by Honore de Balzac: cent interest. But all I had did not suffice to cover the full amount.
We were lovers enough for her to offer, and me to accept, her
savings--"
"What! besides her other virtues does that adorable woman lay by
money?" cried his uncle.
"Don't laugh at her, uncle; her position has obliged her to be very
careful. Her husband went to Greece in 1820 and died there three years
later. It has been impossible, up to the present time, to get legal
proofs of his death, or obtain the will which he made leaving his
whole property to his wife. These papers were either lost or stolen,
or have gone astray during the troubles in Greece,--a country where
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