| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Island Nights' Entertainments by Robert Louis Stevenson: sighing, I shall know that I am near the bottle."
So it befell at last that he was recommended to a Haole in
Beritania Street. When he came to the door, about the hour of the
evening meal, there were the usual marks of the new house, and the
young garden, and the electric light shining in the windows; but
when the owner came, a shock of hope and fear ran through Keawe;
for here was a young man, white as a corpse, and black about the
eyes, the hair shedding from his head, and such a look in his
countenance as a man may have when he is waiting for the gallows.
"Here it is, to be sure," thought Keawe, and so with this man he
noways veiled his errand. "I am come to buy the bottle," said 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 House of Mirth by Edith Wharton: keeping her sense of it out of her eyes.
"DENOUEMENT--isn't that too big a word for such a small incident?
The worst of it, after all, is the fatigue which Bertha has
probably slept off by this time."
She clung to the note bravely, though its futility was now plain
to her in the glare of his miserable eyes.
"Don't--don't---!" he broke out, with the hurt cry of a child;
and while she tried to merge her sympathy, and her resolve to
ignore any cause for it, in one ambiguous murmur of deprecation,
he dropped down on the bench near which they had paused, and
poured out the wretchedness of his soul.
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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 Heart of the West by O. Henry: a fence looking at him? He pretends he hasn't got a thing in his hand,
and that the cat don't see him, and that he don't see the cat. That's
the idea. Never drag her hand out where she'll have to take notice of
it. Don't let her know that you think she knows you have the least
idea she is aware you are holding her hand. That was my rule of
tactics; and as far as Paisley's serenade about hostilities and
misadventure went, he might as well have been reading to her a time-
table of the Sunday trains that stop at Ocean Grove, New Jersey.
"One night when I beat Paisley to the bench by one pipeful, my
friendship gets subsidised for a minute, and I asks Mrs. Jessup if she
didn't think a 'H' was easier to write than a 'J.' In a second her
Heart of the West |
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 Call of the Canyon by Zane Grey: so fierce an anger that she seemed to have swelling veins of fire.
"Queer how Kilbourne went into raising hogs," observed Morrison. "Such a
low-down sort of work, you know."
"He had no choice," replied Carley. "Glenn didn't have a father who made
tainted millions out of the war. He had to work. And I must differ with you
about its being low-down. No honest work is that. It is idleness that is
low down."
"But so foolish of Glenn when he might have married money," rejoined
Morrison, sarcastcally.
"The honor of soldiers is beyond your ken, Mr. Morrison."
He flushed darkly and bit his lip.
The Call of the Canyon |
