| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: two-thirds of her own stature. She excelled them by the
boldness of her profile. Her great bald summit, clear of
trees and pasture, a cairn of quartz and cinnabar, rejected
kinship with the dark and shaggy wilderness of lesser hill-
tops.
CHAPTER II - THE PETRIFIED FOREST
WE drove off from the Springs Hotel about three in the
afternoon. The sun warmed me to the heart. A broad, cool
wind streamed pauselessly down the valley, laden with
perfume. Up at the top stood Mount Saint Helena, a bulk of
mountain, bare atop, with tree-fringed spurs, and radiating
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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 Mucker by Edgar Rice Burroughs: might take advantage of the wind and make the shore that
rose abruptly from the bosom of the ocean but a league away.
Before the work was completed the wind increased rapidly,
so that when the tiny bit of canvas was hoisted into position it
bellied bravely, and the Halfmoon moved heavily forward
toward the land.
"We gotta make a mighty quick run of it," said Skipper
Simms to Ward, "or we'll go to pieces on them rocks afore
ever we find a landing."
"That we will if this wind rises much more," replied Ward;
"and's far as I can see there ain't no more chance to make a
The Mucker |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Contrast by Royall Tyler: VAN ROUGH
Why, Mary, you have not let this gentleman make
love to you without my leave?
MANLY
I did not say, Sir--
MARIA
Say, Sir!--I--the gentleman, to be sure, met
me accidentally.
VAN ROUGH
Ha, ha, ha! Mark me, Mary; young folks think
old folks to be fools; but old folks know young folks
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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 Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne: followed; and in two minutes they reached the banks of the stream,
and stopped fifty paces from the pyre, upon which still lay the rajah's corpse.
In the semi-obscurity they saw the victim, quite senseless, stretched out
beside her husband's body. Then a torch was brought, and the wood,
heavily soaked with oil, instantly took fire.
At this moment Sir Francis and the guide seized Phileas Fogg, who,
in an instant of mad generosity, was about to rush upon the pyre.
But he had quickly pushed them aside, when the whole scene suddenly changed.
A cry of terror arose. The whole multitude prostrated themselves,
terror-stricken, on the ground.
The old rajah was not dead, then, since he rose of a sudden,
Around the World in 80 Days |
