| 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: neglect, and I will be browbeat by no man living. My mind is quite
made up, and come what may, I will not depart from it a hair's breadth.
You and me are to sit here in company till her return: upon which,
without either word or look from you, she and I are to go forth again
to hold our talk. If she can satisfy me that she is willing to this
step, I will then make it; and if she cannot, I will not."
He leaped out of his chair like a man stung. "I can spy your
manoeuvre," he cried; "you would work upon her to refuse!"
"Maybe ay, and maybe no," said I. "That is the way it is to be,
whatever."
"And if I refuse?" cries he.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus by L. Frank Baum: sharp thorns from bramblebushes. Then the Knooks, bearing the spears
they used when they were forced to prod their savage beasts into
submission. The Fairies, dressed in white gauze with rainbow-hued
wings, bore golden wands, and the Wood-nymphs, in their uniforms of
oak-leaf green, carried switches from ash trees as weapons.
Loud laughed the Awgwa King when he beheld the size and the arms of
his foes. To be sure the mighty ax of the Woodsman was to be dreaded,
but the sweet-faced Nymphs and pretty Fairies, the gentle Ryls and
crooked Knooks were such harmless folk that he almost felt shame at
having called such a terrible host to oppose them.
"Since these fools dare fight," he said to the leader of the Tatary
The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Reminiscences of Tolstoy by Leo Tolstoy: brother, who was so strange and remote from him, but at the same
time so near and so akin.
FET, STRAKHOF, GAY
"WHAT'S this saber doing here?" asked a young guardsman, Lieutenant
Afanásyi Afanásyevitch Fet, of the footman one day
as he entered the hall of Iván Sergéyevitch
Turgénieff's flat in St. Petersburg in the middle of the
fifties.
"It is Count Tolstoy's saber; he is asleep in the
drawing-room. And Iván Sergéyevitch is in his study
having breakfast," replied Zalchar.
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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 Trooper Peter Halket of Mashonaland by Olive Schreiner: "a small wound, isn't it?"
"A pistol shot," said the Englishman, closing the bosom.
"A pistol--"
The Englishman looked up at him with a keen light in his eye.
"I told you he would not kill that nigger.--See--here--" He took up the
knife which had fallen from Peter Halket's grasp, and fitted it into a
piece of the cut leather that lay on the earth.
"But you don't think--" The Colonial stared at him with wide open eyes;
then he glanced round at the Captain's tent.
"Yes, I think that-- Go and fetch his great-coat; we'll put him in it. If
it is no use talking while a man is alive, it is no use talking when he is
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