| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte: bird; wheeling over our heads in the middle of the moor. It wanted
to get to its nest, for the clouds had touched the swells, and it
felt rain coming. This feather was picked up from the heath, the
bird was not shot: we saw its nest in the winter, full of little
skeletons. Heathcliff set a trap over it, and the old ones dared
not come. I made him promise he'd never shoot a lapwing after
that, and he didn't. Yes, here are more! Did he shoot my
lapwings, Nelly? Are they red, any of them? Let me look.'
'Give over with that baby-work!' I interrupted, dragging the pillow
away, and turning the holes towards the mattress, for she was
removing its contents by handfuls. 'Lie down and shut your eyes:
Wuthering Heights |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Lin McLean by Owen Wister: you bet! Oh no. Maybe I used to travel on that basis. But see here" (Lin
laid his hand on my shoulder), "if you can't expect a good time for
yourself in reason, you can sure make the kids happy out o' reason, can't
yu'?"
I fairly opened my mouth at him.
"Oh yes," he said, laughing in that short way again (and he took his hand
off my shoulder); "I've been thinking a wonderful lot since we met last.
I guess I know some things yu' haven't got to yet yourself-- Why, there's
a girl!"
"That there is!" said I. "And certainly the world owes her a better--"
"She's a fine-looker," interrupted Mr. McLean, paying me no further
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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 The Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton: private jokes with people or about them; and Lansing was
irritated with himself for perpetually suspecting his best
friends of vague complicities at his expense. "If I'm going to
be jealous of Streffy now--!" he concluded with a grimace of
self-derision.
Certainly Susy looked lovely enough to justify the most
irrational pangs. As a girl she had been, for some people's
taste, a trifle fine-drawn and sharp-edged; now, to her old
lightness of line was added a shadowy bloom, a sort of star-
reflecting depth. Her movements were slower, less angular; her
mouth had a needing droop, her lids seemed weighed down by their
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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 This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald: part of another verse that she couldn't find a beginning for:
"...But wisdom passes ... still the years
Will feed us wisdom.... Age will go
Back to the old For all our tears
We shall not know."
Eleanor hated Maryland passionately. She belonged to the oldest
of the old families of Ramilly County and lived in a big, gloomy
house with her grandfather. She had been born and brought up in
France.... I see I am starting wrong. Let me begin again.
Amory was bored, as he usually was in the country. He used to go
for far walks by himselfand wander along reciting "Ulalume" to
This Side of Paradise |
