| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Montezuma's Daughter by H. Rider Haggard: as Cortes did by the Indians of Anahuac. Our manhood to the slave
bench, our daughters to dishonour, our souls to the loving-kindness
of the priest, our wealth to the Emperor and the Pope! God has
answered them with his winds, Drake has answered them with his
guns. They are gone, and with them the glory of Spain.
I, Thomas Wingfield, heard the news to-day on this very Thursday in
the Bungay market-place, whither I went to gossip and to sell the
apples which these dreadful gales have left me, as they hang upon
my trees.
Before there had been rumours of this and of that, but here in
Bungay was a man named Young, of the Youngs of Yarmouth, who had
Montezuma's Daughter |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fables by Robert Louis Stevenson: aware of the thing as it were a babe unmothered, and she took it to
her arms, and it melted in her arms like the air.
"Come," said the man, "behold a vision of our children, the busy
hearth, and the white heads. And let that suffice, for it is all
God offers."
"I have no delight in it," said she; but with that she sighed.
"The ways of life are straight like the grooves of launching," said
the man; and he took her by the hand.
"And what shall we do with the horseshoe?" quoth she.
"I will give it to your father," said the man; "and he can make a
kirk and a mill of it for me."
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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 Paz by Honore de Balzac: showed the utmost horror of each other, and when one of them was asked
why, he replied with a glance at his companion in misery: "Why?
because he's a Jansenist!" Dante would gladly have stabbed a Guelf had
he met him in exile. This explains the virulent attacks of the French
against the venerable Prince Adam Czartoryski, and the dislike shown
to the better class of Polish exiles by the shopkeeping Caesars and
the licensed Alexanders of Paris.
In 1834, therefore, Adam Mitgislas Laginski was something of a butt
for Parisian pleasantry.
"He is rather nice, though he is a Pole," said Rastignac.
"All these Poles pretend to be great lords," said Maxime de Trailles,
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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 At the Earth's Core by Edgar Rice Burroughs: others in the plot to aid him. Nor can I believe that,
since all my people were loyal to me and would have made
short work of Hooja had he suggested the heartless scheme,
even had he had time to acquaint another with it.
It was all done so quickly that I may only believe that it
was the result of sudden impulse, aided by a number of,
to Hooja, fortuitous circumstances occurring at precisely
the right moment.
All I know is that it was Hooja who brought Dian
to the prospector, still wrapped from head to toe
in the skin of an enormous cave lion which covered her
At the Earth's Core |
