| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: all the complaints of their insufficient equipment, of their
obsolete rules, of failure (they say) in the matter of quick
despatch, no ship need ever issue from their gates in a half-
fainting condition. London is a general cargo port, as is only
proper for the greatest capital of the world to be. General cargo
ports belong to the aristocracy of the earth's trading places, and
in that aristocracy London, as it is its way, has a unique
physiognomy.
The absence of picturesqueness cannot be laid to the charge of the
docks opening into the Thames. For all my unkind comparisons to
swans and backyards, it cannot be denied that each dock or group of
The Mirror of the Sea |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: perhaps I could get the loan of it from somebody; or perhaps it
would be possible to have some one read a file for me and make
notes. This would be extremely bad, as unhappily one man's food is
another man's poison, and the reader would probably leave out
everything I should choose. But if you are reduced to that, you
might mention to the man who is to read for me that balloon
ascensions are in the order of the day.
4th. It might be as well to get a book on balloon ascension,
particularly in the early part of the century.
. . . . .
III. At last this book has come from Scribner, and, alas! I have
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Beauty and The Beast by Bayard Taylor: test the matter. We had no considerable sympathy with the snobbish
parents, whose servility to a title was so apparent; but the
daughter seemed to be an innocent and amiable creature, however
silly, and we determined to spare her the shame of an open scandal.
If our scheme should seem a little melodramatic, it must not be
forgotten that my friend was an author. The next morning, as the
Baron came up the terrace after his visit to the spring, I stepped
forward and greeted him politely, after which I said: "I see by
the strangers' list that you are from East Prussia, Baron; have you
ever been in Poland?" At that moment, a voice behind him called
out rather sharply, "Jean!" The Baron started, turned round and
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