| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde: to have any amusement in life. I happen to be serious about
Bunburying. What on earth you are serious about I haven't got the
remotest idea. About everything, I should fancy. You have such an
absolutely trivial nature.
JACK. Well, the only small satisfaction I have in the whole of
this wretched business is that your friend Bunbury is quite
exploded. You won't be able to run down to the country quite so
often as you used to do, dear Algy. And a very good thing too.
ALGERNON. Your brother is a little off colour, isn't he, dear
Jack? You won't be able to disappear to London quite so frequently
as your wicked custom was. And not a bad thing either.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Child of Storm by H. Rider Haggard: but I gather that, in one way or another, Saduko made himself
sufficiently agreeable to the princess to persuade her to take him to
husband. Perhaps, being already enamoured of him, she was not difficult
to persuade. At any rate, on the morrow, without any great feasting or
fuss, except the customary dance, the umqoliso, the "Ox of the Girl,"
was slaughtered, and Saduko became the husband of a royal maiden of the
House of Senzangakona.
Certainly, as I remember reflecting, it was a remarkable rise in life
for one who, but a few months before, had been without possessions or a
home.
I may add that, after our brief talk in the King's kraal, while Panda
Child of Storm |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from A Voyage to Abyssinia by Father Lobo: Egypt, which owes to the annual inundations of this river its envied
fertility. I know not anything of the rest of its passage, but that
it receives great increases from many other rivers; that it has
several cataracts like the first already described, and that few
fish are to be found in it, which scarcity, doubtless, is to be
attributed to the river-horses and crocodiles, which destroy the
weaker inhabitants of these waters, and something may be allowed to
the cataracts, it being difficult for fish to fall so far without
being killed.
Although some who have travelled in Asia and Africa have given the
world their descriptions of crocodiles and hippopotamus, or river-
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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 Tapestried Chamber by Walter Scott: General Browne accepted the invitation, though somewhat
unwillingly. It was evident he was not to breathe freely or at
ease till he left Woodville Castle far behind him. He could not
refuse his friend's invitation, however; and the less so, that he
was a little ashamed of the peevishness which he had displayed
towards his well-meaning entertainer.
The General, therefore, followed Lord Woodville through several
rooms into a long gallery hung with pictures, which the latter
pointed out to his guest, telling the names, and giving some
account of the personages whose portraits presented themselves in
progression. General Browne was but little interested in the
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