| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte: silence of those solitary roads and desert hills, I heard it
approach from a great distance. It was the same vehicle whence, a
year ago, I had alighted one summer evening on this very spot--how
desolate, and hopeless, and objectless! It stopped as I beckoned.
I entered--not now obliged to part with my whole fortune as the
price of its accommodation. Once more on the road to Thornfield, I
felt like the messenger-pigeon flying home.
It was a journey of six-and-thirty hours. I had set out from
Whitcross on a Tuesday afternoon, and early on the succeeding
Thursday morning the coach stopped to water the horses at a wayside
inn, situated in the midst of scenery whose green hedges and large
Jane Eyre |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lord Arthur Savile's Crime, etc. by Oscar Wilde: of the town, and for the space of seven months there was no rain.
We know at any rate that ROMEO AND JULIET was brought out at
Dresden in 1613, along with HAMLET and KING LEAR, and it was surely
to none other than Willie Hughes that in 1615 the death-mask of
Shakespeare was brought by the hand of one of the suite of the
English ambassador, pale token of the passing away of the great
poet who had so dearly loved him. Indeed there would have been
something peculiarly fitting in the idea that the boy-actor, whose
beauty had been so vital an element in the realism and romance of
Shakespeare's art, should have been the first to have brought to
Germany the seed of the new culture, and was in his way the
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Options by O. Henry: the chip over the bug?"
"If I understand your figurative language," answered Colonel Telfair,
"it is this: the article you refer to was handed to me by the owners
of the magazine with instructions to publish it. The literary quality
of it did not appeal to me. But, in a measure, I feel impelled to
conform, in certain matters, to the wishes of the gentlemen who are
interested in the financial side of The Rose."
"I see," said Thacker. "Next we have two pages of selections from
'Lalla Rookh,' by Thomas Moore. Now, what Federal prison did Moore
escape from, or what's the name of the F. F. V. family that he
carries as a handicap?"
Options |
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 Nada the Lily by H. Rider Haggard: doctors, male and female, entered the kraal. There were a hundred and
a half of them, and they were made hideous and terrible with the white
bones of men, with bladders of fish and of oxen, with fat of wizards,
and with skins of snakes. They walked in silence till they came in
front of the Intunkulu, the royal house; then they stopped and sang
this song for the king to hear:--
We have come, O king, we have come from the caves and the rocks
and the swamps,
To wash in the blood of the slain;
We have gathered our host from the air as vultures are gathered in
war.
Nada the Lily |
