| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from 1492 by Mary Johntson: tall Admiral, his thick white hair, his eagle nose, his strong
mouth. Diego de Arana was big, alert and soldierly; Roderigo
Sanchez had the look of alcalde through half a lifetime.
I had seen Roderigo de Escobedo's like in dark streets
in France and Italy and Castile, and Pedro Gutierrez wherever
was a court. Juan de la Cosa, the master, stood a
keen man, thin as a string. Out of the crowd of mariners
I pick Sancho and Beltran the cook, Ruiz the pilot, William
the Irishman and Arthur the Englishman, and two or three
others. And Luis Torres. The latter was a thinker, and
a Jew in blood. He carried it in his face, considerably
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The School For Scandal by Richard Brinsley Sheridan: to the Sentiments he professes--but for the other[,] take my word
for't [if] he had any grain of Virtue by descent--he has dissipated it
with the rest of his inheritance. Ah! my old Friend, Sir Oliver will
be deeply mortified when he finds how Part of his Bounty has been
misapplied.
ROWLEY. I am sorry to find you so violent against the young man
because this may be the most critical Period of his Fortune.
I came hither with news that will surprise you.
SIR PETER. What! let me hear--
ROWLEY. Sir Oliver is arrived and at this moment in Town.
SIR PETER. How!--you astonish me--I thought you did not expect him
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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 Heritage of the Desert by Zane Grey: winding under crags, the latter part climbing long slopes. It forked
before the summit, where dark pine trees showed against the sky, one fork
ascending, the other, which Piute took, beginning to go down. It
admitted of no extended view, being shut in for the most part on the
left, but there were times when Hare could see a curving stream of sheep
on half a mile of descending trail. Once started down the flock could
not be stopped, that was as plain as Piute's hard task. There were times
when Hare could have tossed a pebble on the Indian just below him, yet
there were more than three thousand sheep, strung out in line between
them. Clouds of dust rolled up, sheets of gravel and shale rattled down
the inclines, the clatter, clatter, clatter of little hoofs, the steady
The Heritage of the Desert |
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 Several Works by Edgar Allan Poe: pores, with dissolution. The scarlet stains upon the body and
especially upon the face of the victim, were the pest ban which
shut him out from the aid and from the sympathy of his fellow-men.
And the whole seizure, progress and termination of the disease,
were the incidents of half an hour.
But the Prince Prospero was happy and dauntless and sagacious.
When his dominions were half depopulated, he summoned to his
presence a thousand hale and light-hearted friends from among the
knights and dames of his court, and with these retired to the deep
seclusion of one of his castellated abbeys. This was an extensive
and magnificent structure, the creation of the prince's own
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