| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Mirror of the Sea by Joseph Conrad: proud of her evil fame, as if they had been an utterly corrupt lot
of desperadoes glorying in their association with an atrocious
creature. We, belonging to other vessels moored all about the
Circular Quay in Sydney, used to shake our heads at her with a
great sense of the unblemished virtue of our own well-loved ships.
I shall not pronounce her name. She is "missing" now, after a
sinister but, from the point of view of her owners, a useful career
extending over many years, and, I should say, across every ocean of
our globe. Having killed a man for every voyage, and perhaps
rendered more misanthropic by the infirmities that come with years
upon a ship, she had made up her mind to kill all hands at once
The Mirror of the Sea |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from On Revenues by Xenophon: period."--"A Companion to School Classics" (James Gow), p. 101,
xiii. "Population of Attica."
With regard to the price then of the men themselves, it is obvious
that the public treasury is in a better position to provide funds than
any private individuals. What can be easier than for the Council[18]
to invite by public proclamation all whom it may concern to bring
their slaves, and to buy up those produced? Assuming the purchase to
be effected, is it credible that people will hesitate to hire from the
state rather than from the private owner, and actually on the same
terms? People have at all events no hesitation at present in hiring
consecrated grounds, sacred victims,[19] houses, etc., or in
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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 Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin: thick cords. The lower lip drops, and is somewhat everted.
The mouth is kept half open, with the lower jaw projecting.
The cheeks are hollow and deeply furrowed in curved lines running
from the wings of the nostrils to the corners of the mouth.
The nostrils themselves are raised and extended. The eyes
are widely opened, and beneath them the skin appears swollen;
the pupils are large. The forehead is wrinkled transversely
in many folds, and at the inner extremities of the eyebrows it
is strongly furrowed in diverging lines, produced by the powerful
and persistent contraction of the corrugators.
Mr. Bell has also described[19] an agony of terror and of despair,
Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals |
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 Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: steps to get round the school. I couldn't count Sophy, but she
takes more than a hundred."'
'FEB. 18TH, 1877. - We all feel very lonely without you. Frewen
had to come up and sit in my room for company last night and I
actually kissed him, a thing that has not occurred for years.
Jack, poor fellow, bears it as well as he can, and has taken the
opportunity of having a fester on his foot, so he is lame and has
it bathed, and this occupies his thoughts a good deal.'
'FEB. 19TH. - As to Mill, Austin has not got the list yet. I think
it will prejudice him very much against Mill - but that is not my
affair. Education of that kind! . . . I would as soon cram my boys
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