| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield: eyebrows. Fenella glanced up. High in the air, a little figure, his hands
thrust in his short jacket pockets, stood staring out to sea. The ship
rocked ever so little, and she thought the stars rocked too. And now a
pale steward in a linen coat, holding a tray high in the palm of his hand,
stepped out of a lighted doorway and skimmed past them. They went through
that doorway. Carefully over the high brass-bound step on to the rubber
mat and then down such a terribly steep flight of stairs that grandma had
to put both feet on each step, and Fenella clutched the clammy brass rail
and forgot all about the swan-necked umbrella.
At the bottom grandma stopped; Fenella was rather afraid she was going to
pray again. But no, it was only to get out the cabin tickets. They were
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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 Wife, et al by Anton Chekhov: dreaming, and from her face it was evident that she was enchanted
by her thoughts.
Ivan Dmitritch pictured to himself autumn with its rains, its
cold evenings, and its St. Martin's summer. At that season he
would have to take longer walks about the garden and beside the
river, so as to get thoroughly chilled, and then drink a big
glass of vodka and eat a salted mushroom or a soused cucumber,
and then -- drink another. . . . The children would come running
from the kitchen-garden, bringing a carrot and a radish smelling
of fresh earth. . . . And then, he would lie stretched full
length on the sofa, and in leisurely fashion turn over the pages
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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 Some Reminiscences by Joseph Conrad: But I had been warned of that fiendish trait, and contradicted
him with great assurance. After a while he left off. So far
good. But his immobility, the thick elbow on the table, the
abrupt, unhappy voice, the shaded and averted face grew more and
more impressive. He kept inscrutably silent for a moment, and
then, placing me in a ship of a certain size, at sea, under
certain conditions of weather, season, locality, &c. &c.--all
very clear and precise--ordered me to execute a certain
manoeuvre. Before I was half through with it he did some
material damage to the ship. Directly I had grappled with the
difficulty he caused another to present itself, and when that too
Some Reminiscences |
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 An Inland Voyage by Robert Louis Stevenson: and settles down broadly on the earth, it looks like the poop of
some great old battle-ship. Hollow-backed buttresses carry vases,
which figure for the stern lanterns. There is a roll in the
ground, and the towers just appear above the pitch of the roof, as
though the good ship were bowing lazily over an Atlantic swell. At
any moment it might be a hundred feet away from you, climbing the
next billow. At any moment a window might open, and some old
admiral thrust forth a cocked hat, and proceed to take an
observation. The old admirals sail the sea no longer; the old
ships of battle are all broken up, and live only in pictures; but
this, that was a church before ever they were thought upon, is
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