| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Letters of Robert Louis Stevenson by Robert Louis Stevenson: calm, or sunrise! An art is a fine fortune, a palace in a park, a
band of music, health, and physical beauty; all but love - to any
worthy practiser. I sleep upon my art for a pillow; I waken in my
art; I am unready for death, because I hate to leave it. I love my
wife, I do not know how much, nor can, nor shall, unless I lost
her; but while I can conceive my being widowed, I refuse the
offering of life without my art. I AM not but in my art; it is me;
I am the body of it merely.
And yet I produce nothing, am the author of BRASHIANA and other
works: tiddy-iddity - as if the works one wrote were anything but
'prentice's experiments. Dear reader, I deceive you with husks,
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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 Emerald City of Oz by L. Frank Baum: and lovely as ever and robed in one of her prettiest gowns.
"Our enemies have not yet arrived," said the Scarecrow, after greeting
affectionately the sweet and girlish Ruler.
"They will soon be here," she said, "for I have just glanced at my
Magic Picture, and have seen them coughing and choking with the dust
in the tunnel."
"Oh, is there dust in the tunnel?" asked the Tin Woodman.
"Yes; Ozma placed it there by means of the Magic Belt," explained the
Scarecrow, with one of his broad smiles.
Then Dorothy came to them, Uncle Henry and Aunt Em following close
after her. The little girl's eyes were heavy because she had had a
The Emerald City of Oz |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Somebody's Little Girl by Martha Young: The tiny little girl was so sick that she only just could breathe
quickly, just so--and just so--.
If Bessie Bell could remember that, it was only that she remembered
the big white cat like a big soft dream. And she might have
remembered how, now and then, the big cat put out a paw and touched
the little girl's cheek, like a soft white dream-touch.
And that little girl had on a night-gown that was long, and soft,
and white, and on that little white night-gown was worked, oh so
carefully, in linen thread: ``Bessie Bell.''
Then the few people who walked about the world in Fever-time came in
to that big house, and they took up that little tiny girl that
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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 The Touchstone by Edith Wharton: reading them," said young Hartly, who was in the cynical stage.
Mrs. Armiger turned her reproachful loveliness to Dresham. "From
the way you defend him, I believe you know who he is."
Everyone looked at Dresham, and his wife smiled with the superior
air of the woman who is in her husband's professional secrets.
Dresham shrugged his shoulders.
"What have I said to defend him?"
"You called him a poor devil--you pitied him."
"A man who could let Margaret Aubyn write to him in that way? Of
course I pity him."
"Then you MUST know who he is," cried Mrs. Armiger, with a
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