| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Rezanov by Gertrude Atherton: said. "My mother tells me that she can live with-
out me no longer, and that Father Abella has re-
minded her that if I stay in the house of Elena Cas-
tro I shall be as free from gossip as here. I infer
that he has rated my two parents for making a
martyr of me unnecessarily, and told them it was
a duty to enliven my life as much as possible before
I enter upon this long period of probation. The grat-
ing of my room at Elena's is above a little strip of
Garden, and faces the blank wall of the next house.
Sometimes--who knows?" She shrugged her
Rezanov |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Frankenstein by Mary Shelley: My trifling occupations take up my time and amuse me, and I am
rewarded for any exertions by seeing none but happy, kind faces
around me. Since you left us, but one change has taken place in
our little household. Do you remember on what occasion Justine
Moritz entered our family? Probably you do not; I will relate her
history, therefore in a few words. Madame Moritz, her mother,
was a widow with four children, of whom Justine was the third.
This girl had always been the favourite of her father, but through a
strange perversity, her mother could not endure her, and after the
death of M. Moritz, treated her very ill. My aunt observed this,
and when Justine was twelve years of age, prevailed on her mother
Frankenstein |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Tarzan the Untamed by Edgar Rice Burroughs: regarding him in silence. Tarzan wondered how long it would
be before they charged and while he waited he resumed his
feeding, though with every sense constantly alert.
One by one the lions lay down, but always their faces were
toward him and their eyes upon him. There had been no
growling and no roaring -- just the quiet drawing of the silent
circle about him. It was all so entirely foreign to anything that
Tarzan ever before had seen lions do that it irritated him so
that presently, having finished his repast, he fell to making
insulting remarks to first one and then another of the lions,
after the habit he had learned from the apes of his childhood.
Tarzan the Untamed |
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 The Second Jungle Book by Rudyard Kipling: saw Phao, his teeth set in the throat of a dhole, tugging the
unwilling beast forward till the yearlings could finish him.
But the bulk of the fight was blind flurry and smother in the
dark; hit, trip, and tumble, yelp, groan, and worry-worry-worry,
round him and behind him and above him. As the night wore on,
the quick, giddy-go-round motion increased. The dholes were
cowed and afraid to attack the stronger wolves, but did not yet
dare to run away. Mowgli felt that the end was coming soon, and
contented himself with striking merely to cripple. The yearlings
were growing bolder; there was time now and again to breathe,
and pass a word to a friend, and the mere flicker of the knife
The Second Jungle Book |
