| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Ann Veronica by H. G. Wells: wrappered world almost at its best. She saw herself building up
a life upon that--a life restrained, kindly, beautiful, a little
pathetic and altogether dignified; a life of great disciplines
and suppressions and extensive reserves. . .
But the Ramage affair needed clearing up, of course; it was a
flaw upon that project. She had to explain about and pay off
that forty pounds. . . .
Then, quite insensibly, her queenliness had declined. She was
never able to trace the changes her attitude had undergone, from
the time when she believed herself to be the pampered Queen of
Fortune, the crown of a good man's love (and secretly, but nobly,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Selected Writings of Guy De Maupassant by Guy De Maupassant: drop of water; our ears deceive us, for they transmit to us the
vibrations of the air in sonorous notes. Our senses are fairies
who work the miracle of changing that movement into noise, and by
that metamorphosis give birth to music, which makes the mute
agitation of nature a harmony. So with our sense of smell, which
is weaker than that of a dog, and so with our sense of taste,
which can scarcely distinguish the age of a wine!
Oh! If we only had other organs which could work other miracles
in our favor, what a number of fresh things we might discover
around us!
May 16. I am ill, decidedly! I was so well last month! I am
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| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Vendetta by Honore de Balzac: "Which tear a daughter from her father?--"
"Monsieur--"
"Which deprive an old man of his last consolation?--"
"Monsieur, your daughter only belongs to you if--"
"And kill him?--"
"Monsieur, permit me--"
There is nothing more horrible than the coolness and precise reasoning
of notaries amid the many passionate scenes in which they are
accustomed to take part.
The forms that Piombo saw about him seemed, to his eyes, escaped from
hell; his repressed and concentrated rage knew no longer any bounds as
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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 Charmides by Plato: shocking to the contemporary of Thucydides and Plato in anacolutha and
repetitions. In such cases the genius of the English language requires
that the translation should be more intelligible than the Greek. The want
of more distinctions between the demonstrative pronouns is also greatly
felt. Two genitives dependent on one another, unless familiarised by
idiom, have an awkward effect in English. Frequently the noun has to take
the place of the pronoun. 'This' and 'that' are found repeating themselves
to weariness in the rough draft of a translation. As in the previous case,
while the feeling of the modern language is more opposed to tautology,
there is also a greater difficulty in avoiding it.
(5) Though no precise rule can be laid down about the repetition of words,
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