| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Desert Gold by Zane Grey: stealthy, upward-stealing glance, that she had rolled up her sleeves,
exposing fine, round arms graceful in line. Her skin was brown--no,
it was more gold than brown. It had a wonderful clear tint. Dick
stoically lowered his eyes then, putting off as long as possible
the alluring moment when he was to look into her face. That would
be a fateful moment. He played with a certain strange joy
of anticipation. When, however, she sat down beside him
and rested his injured hand in her lap as she cut bandages,
she was so thrillingly near that he yielded to an irrepressible
desire to look up. She had a sweet, fair face warmly tinted with
that same healthy golden-brown sunburn. Her hair was light gold
Desert Gold |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Redheaded Outfield by Zane Grey: late in the afternoon. As it was a physical
impossibility for Nan to rest her head all day upon
her husband's broad shoulder, the boys toward
dinner time came out of their jealous trance. I
heard them plotting something. When dinner
was called, about half of my party, including the
bride and groom, went at once into the dining-car.
Time there flew by swiftly. And later, when we
were once more in our Pullman, and I had gotten
interested in a game of cards with Milly and
Stringer and his wife, the Rube came marching
The Redheaded Outfield |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.
Letter: TO ALISON CUNNINGHAM
VAILIMA, DECEMBER 5, 1893.
MY DEAREST CUMMY, - This goes to you with a Merry Christmas and a
Happy New Year. The Happy New Year anyway, for I think it should
reach you about NOOR'S DAY. I dare say it may be cold and frosty.
Do you remember when you used to take me out of bed in the early
morning, carry me to the back windows, show me the hills of Fife,
and quote to me.
'A' the hills are covered wi' snaw,
An' winter's noo come fairly'?
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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 Night and Day by Virginia Woolf: and the voices of men crying old iron and vegetables in one of the
poorer streets at the back of the house. Rooms, of course, accumulate
their suggestions, and any room in which one has been used to carry on
any particular occupation gives off memories of moods, of ideas, of
postures that have been seen in it; so that to attempt any different
kind of work there is almost impossible.
Katharine was unconsciously affected, each time she entered her
mother's room, by all these influences, which had had their birth
years ago, when she was a child, and had something sweet and solemn
about them, and connected themselves with early memories of the
cavernous glooms and sonorous echoes of the Abbey where her
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