| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Finished by H. Rider Haggard: the Black One cut off shortly before his death, because when he
killed her father, she saw the future and prophesied a like death
to him, although then she was but a child. This woman is of our
company, being a witch-doctoress. I will send a Spirit to her,
if you so will it, to warn her to watch for you and your company,
O King, and show you the mouth of the kloof, where are some old
huts and water. There you will never be found unless you are
betrayed."
"Who can betray me when none know whither I am going?" asked
Cetewayo. "Send the Spirit, send it at once, that this one-armed
witch may make ready."
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from My Aunt Margaret's Mirror by Walter Scott: it which he has been always obliged to give up as inexplicable.
Another symptom is a momentary hesitation to look round you, when
the interest of the narrative is at the highest; and the third, a
desire to avoid looking into a mirror when you are alone in your
chamber for the evening. I mean such are signs which indicate
the crisis, when a female imagination is in due temperature to
enjoy a ghost story. I do not pretend to describe those which
express the same disposition in a gentleman."
"That last symptom, dear aunt, of shunning the mirror seems
likely to be a rare occurrence amongst the fair sex."
"You are a novice in toilet fashions, my dear cousin. All women
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau by Honore de Balzac: The vile uncleanliness of manufactories is their leading feature. Old
Gigonnet lived on the third floor of a house whose window-sashes, with
small and very dirty panes, swung by the middle, on pivots. The
staircase opened directly upon the street. The porter's lodge was on
the /entresol/, in a space which was lighted only from the staircase.
All the lodgers, with the exception of Gigonnet, worked at trades.
Workmen were continually coming and going. The stairs were caked with
a layer of mud, hard or soft according to the state of the atmosphere,
and were covered with filth. Each landing of this noisome stairway
bore the names of the occupants in gilt letters on a metal plate,
painted red and varnished, to which were attached specimens of their
Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau |
