| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Collected Articles by Frederick Douglass: but I was compelled at last to seek some one who would befriend me without
taking advantage of my destitution to betray me. Such a person I found
in a sailor named Stuart, a warm-hearted and generous fellow, who, from his
humble home on Centre street, saw me standing on the opposite sidewalk,
near the Tombs prison. As he approached me, I ventured a remark to him
which at once enlisted his interest in me. He took me to his home to spend
the night, and in the morning went with me to Mr. David Ruggles,
the secretary of the New York Vigilance Committee, a co-worker with
Isaac T. Hopper, Lewis and Arthur Tappan, Theodore S. Wright, Samuel Cornish,
Thomas Downing, Philip A. Bell, and other true men of their time.
All these (save Mr. Bell, who still lives, and is editor and publisher of a paper
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: like to know where I'm to find the whites?
THE BOTTLE IMP.
Note. - Any student of that very unliterary product, the English
drama of the early part of the century, will here recognise the
name and the root idea of a piece once rendered popular by the
redoubtable O. Smith. The root idea is there and identical, and
yet I hope I have made it a new thing. And the fact that the tale
has been designed and written for a Polynesian audience may lend it
some extraneous interest nearer home. - R. L. S.
THERE was a man of the Island of Hawaii, whom I shall call Keawe;
for the truth is, he still lives, and his name must be kept secret;
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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 The Lamentable Tragedy of Locrine and Mucedorus by William Shakespeare: Seal thee an acquitance for thy bold attempts.
[Exeunt.]
[Sound the alarm. Enter Locrine, Assarachus, and a
soldier at one door; Gwendoline, Thrasimachus, at
an other; Locrine and his followers driven back.
Then let Locrine & Estrild enter again in a maze.]
LOCRINE.
O fair Estrild, we have lost the field;
Thrasimachus hath won the victory,
And we are left to be a laughing stock,
Scoft at by those that are our enemies.
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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 Symposium by Plato: me, son of Acumenus, was there not reason in my fears? and was I not a true
prophet when I said that Agathon would make a wonderful oration, and that I
should be in a strait?
The part of the prophecy which concerns Agathon, replied Eryximachus,
appears to me to be true; but not the other part--that you will be in a
strait.
Why, my dear friend, said Socrates, must not I or any one be in a strait
who has to speak after he has heard such a rich and varied discourse? I am
especially struck with the beauty of the concluding words--who could listen
to them without amazement? When I reflected on the immeasurable
inferiority of my own powers, I was ready to run away for shame, if there
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