| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from A Child's Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson: For wherever they're lying, in cupboard or shelf,
'T is he will take care of your playthings himself!
II
My Ship and I
O it's I that am the captain of a tidy little ship,
Of a ship that goes a sailing on the pond;
And my ship it keeps a-turning all around and all about;
But when I'm a little older, I shall find the secret out
How to send my vessel sailing on beyond.
For I mean to grow a little as the dolly at the helm,
And the dolly I intend to come alive;
A Child's Garden of Verses |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Beasts of Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs: close-set eyes, the shifty expression, the drooping yellow moustache.
Instantly it occurred to the ape-man that this fellow had
not been among those who had accompanied Rokoff at the
village where Tarzan had been a prisoner. He had seen them all,
and this fellow had not been there. There could be but one
explanation--he it was who had fled ahead of the Russian with
the woman and the child--and the woman had been Jane Clayton.
He was sure now of the meaning of Rokoff's words.
The ape-man's face went white as he looked upon the pasty,
vice-marked countenance of the Swede. Across Tarzan's forehead
stood out the broad band of scarlet that marked the scar where,
The Beasts of Tarzan |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: But maddened with this slight advantage, he cried, "I cannot live
without the possession of that lovely body, and those marvels of love.
Kill me then!" And again he attacked the royal preserves. The young
beauty, whose head was full of the king, was not even touched by this
great love, said gravely, "If you menace me further, it is not you but
myself I will kill." She glared at him so savagely that the poor man
was quite terrified, and commenced to deplore the evil hour in which
he had taken her to wife, and thus the night which should have been so
joyous, was passed in tears, lamentations, prayers, and ejaculations.
In vain he tempted her with promises; she should eat out of gold, she
should be a great lady, he would buy houses and lands for her. Oh! if
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
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 Almayer's Folly by Joseph Conrad: she stretched the other lean arm and claw-like hand to emphasise,
in a passion of anger and contempt, the rapid rush of scathing
remarks and bitter cursings heaped on the head of the man
unworthy to associate with brave Malay chiefs. It ended
generally by Almayer rising slowly, his long pipe in hand, his
face set into a look of inward pain, and walking away in silence.
He descended the steps and plunged into the long grass on his way
to the solitude of his new house, dragging his feet in a state of
physical collapse from disgust and fear before that fury. She
followed to the head of the steps, and sent the shafts of
indiscriminate abuse after the retreating form. And each of
Almayer's Folly |
