| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from A Straight Deal by Owen Wister: Washington requested his recall? Or the French privateers that a little
later, about 1797-98, preyed upon our commerce? And the hatred of France
which many Americans felt and expressed at that time? How many remember
that the King of France, directly our Revolution was over, was more
hostile to us than England?
Chapter X: Jackstraws
Jackstraws is a game which most of us have played in our youth. You empty
on a table a box of miniature toy rakes, shovels, picks, axes, all sorts
of tools and implements. These lie under each other and above each other
in intricate confusion, not unlike cross timber in a western forest, only
instead of being logs, they are about two inches long and very light. The
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Rezanov by Gertrude Atherton: molinillo in each cup as it was filled, whipping the
fragrant liquid to froth; pausing only to scold when
her servant stained one of the dainty saucers or
cups. Poor Rosa did not sing, although the spring
attuned her broken spirit to a gentler melancholy
than when the winds howled and the fog was cold
in her marrow. She had been sentenced by the last
Governor, the wise Borica, to eight years of domes-
tic servitude in the house of Don Jose Arguello for
abetting her lover in the murder of his wife. Con-
cha, thoughtless in many things, did what she could
Rezanov |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Christ in Flanders by Honore de Balzac: off the strange visitor. He copied on his own rough and swarthy
features the imperturbability of the other's face, applying to this
task the whole strength of a will and intelligence but little
corrupted in the course of a life of mechanical and passive obedience.
So emulous was he of a calm and tranquil courage greater than his own,
that at last, perhaps unconsciously, something of that mysterious
nature passed into his own soul. His admiration became an instinctive
zeal for this man, a boundless love for and belief in him, such a love
as soldiers feel for their leader when he has the power of swaying
other men, when the halo of victories surrounds him, and the magical
fascination of genius is felt in all that he does. The poor outcast
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