| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs: shot had pinged so perilously close--fired at a perfect target
but fifty yards away.
At the sound of the report the robber's horse reared and
plunged, then, wheeling and tottering high upon its hind feet,
fell backward. Billy, realizing that his mount had been hit,
tried to throw himself from the saddle; but until the very
moment that the beast toppled over the man was held by his
cartridge belt which, as the animal first lunged, had caught
over the high horn of the Mexican saddle.
The belt slipped from the horn as the horse was falling, and
Billy succeeded in throwing himself a little to one side. One
The Mucker |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from A Collection of Beatrix Potter by Beatrix Potter: BUT Peter, who was very
naughty, ran straight
away to Mr. McGregor's
garden and squeezed under
the gate!
FIRST he ate some lettuces
and some French beans;
and then he ate some radishes;
AND then, feeling rather
sick, he went to look for
some parsley.
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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 Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: economy of their silk. We have seen them, after the manufacture of
the net, eating the central guide-post, a modest mouthful; we now
see them gobbling up the whole web, a meal. Refined and turned
into fluid by the stomach, the materials of the old net will serve
for other purposes.
As goon as the site is thoroughly cleared, the work of the frame
and the net begins on the support of the suspension-cable which was
respected. Would it not be simpler to restore the old web, which
might serve many times yet, if a few rents were just repaired? One
would say so; but does the Spider know how to patch her work, as a
thrifty housewife darns her linen? That is the question.
The Life of the Spider |
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 Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne: intricate, and shadowy as the untamed forest, amid the gloom of
which they were now holding a colloquy that was to decide their
fate. Her intellect and heart had their home, as it were, in
desert places, where she roamed as freely as the wild Indian in
his woods. For years past she had looked from this estranged
point of view at human institutions, and whatever priests or
legislators had established; criticising all with hardly more
reverence than the Indian would feel for the clerical band, the
judicial robe, the pillory, the gallows, the fireside, or the
church. The tendency of her fate and fortunes had been to set
her flee. The scarlet letter was her passport into regions
The Scarlet Letter |
