| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Tapestried Chamber by Walter Scott: this occasion, which my friends are good enough to hold as a sort
of holiday. Do not think you have been unwatched during the
years you have been absent from us. I have traced you through
your dangers, your triumphs, your misfortunes, and was delighted
to see that, whether in victory or defeat, the name of my old
friend was always distinguished with applause."
The General made a suitable reply, and congratulated his friend
on his new dignities, and the possession of a place and domain so
beautiful.
"Nay, you have seen nothing of it as yet," said Lord Woodville,
"and I trust you do not mean to leave us till you are better
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Golden Threshold by Sarojini Naidu: that warms one's blood, and sees the eager hurrying faces of men
and women in the street, dramatic faces over which the disturbing
experiences of life have passed and left their symbols, one's
heart thrills up into one's throat. No, no, no, a thousand times
no! how can one deliberately renounce this coloured, unquiet,
fiery human life of the earth?" And, all the time, her subtle
criticism is alert, and this woman of the East marvels at the
women of the West, "the beautiful worldly women of the West,"
whom she sees walking in the Cascine, "taking the air so
consciously attractive in their brilliant toilettes, in the
brilliant coquetry of their manner!" She finds them "a little
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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 An Unsocial Socialist by George Bernard Shaw: only five thousand. Here was a problem for my young mind.
Required, something from which my father abstained and in which
his workmen exceeded, and which he abstained from more and more
as he grew richer and richer. The only thing that answered this
description was hard work, and as I never met a sane man willing
to pay another for idling, I began to see that these prodigious
payments to my father were extorted by force. To do him justice,
he never boasted of abstinence. He considered himself a
hard-worked man, and claimed his fortune as the reward of his
risks, his calculations, his anxieties, and the journeys he had
to make at all seasons and at all hours. This comforted me
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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 Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs: sings of Knibbs's:
There ain't no sweet Penelope somewhere that's longing much for me,
But I can smell the blundering sea, and hear the rigging hum;
And I can hear the whispering lips that fly before the out-bound ships,
And I can hear the breakers on the sand a-calling "Come!"
Billy took off his hat and scratched his head.
"Funny," he thought, "how a girl and poetry can get a
tough nut like me. I wonder what the guys that used to hang
out in back of Kelly's 'ud say if they seen what was goin' on
in my bean just now. They'd call me Lizzy, eh? Well, they
wouldn't call me Lizzy more'n once. I may be gettin' soft in
The Mucker |
