| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Moon-Face and Other Stories by Jack London: 'dote' on."
But he did not notice the sneer. "Oh, I don't know," he chuckled. "I'm going
up to-morrow to try pretty hard."
Thus was assurance made doubly sure, and I went back to my house hugging
myself with rapture.
Early next morning I saw him go by with a dip-net and gunnysack, and Bellona
trotting at his heels. I knew where he was bound, and cut out by the back
pasture and climbed through the underbrush to the top of the mountain. Keeping
carefully out of sight, I followed the crest along for a couple of miles to a
natural amphitheatre in the hills, where the little river raced down out of a
gorge and stopped for breath in a large and placid rock-bound pool. That was
|
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Travels with a Donkey in the Cevenne by Robert Louis Stevenson: ridge upon ridge, heathery, craggy, the sun glittering on veins of
rock, the underwood clambering in the hollows, as rude as God made
them at the first. There was not a sign of man's hand in all the
prospect; and indeed not a trace of his passage, save where
generation after generation had walked in twisted footpaths, in and
out among the beeches, and up and down upon the channelled slopes.
The mists, which had hitherto beset me, were now broken into
clouds, and fled swiftly and shone brightly in the sun. I drew a
long breath. It was grateful to come, after so long, upon a scene
of some attraction for the human heart. I own I like definite form
in what my eyes are to rest upon; and if landscapes were sold, like
|
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Glasses by Henry James: of her start, the grasp of the hand she had impulsively snatched
from me. It was the irrepressible question in this grasp that
stopped on my lips all sound of salutation. She had mistaken my
entrance for that of another person, a pair of lips without a
moustache. She was feeling me to see who I was! With the
perception of this and of her not seeing me I sat gaping at her and
at the wild word that didn't come, the right word to express or to
disguise my dismay. What was the right word to commemorate one's
sudden discovery, at the very moment too at which one had been most
encouraged to count on better things, that one's dear old friend
had gone blind? Before the answer to this question dropped upon
|
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 Puck of Pook's Hill by Rudyard Kipling: words - your thick heads can understand." He pointed
through the door to the foot of a catapult wound up.
"'We understand," said an elder. "The Wall must be
won at a price?"
"'It grieves me," said Pertinax, laughing, "but so it
must be won," and he gave them of our best Southern wine.
'They drank, and wiped their yellow beards in silence
till they rose to go.
'Said Amal, stretching himself (for they were barbarians):
"We be a goodly company; I wonder what the
ravens and the dogfish will make of some of us before this
|
