| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Betty Zane by Zane Grey: places the top rail had disappeared. The pine trees in the yard were weighted
down and drooped helplessly with their white burden.
On this frosty January morning the only signs of life round the settlement
were a man and a dog walking up Wheeling hill. The man carried a rifle, an
axe, and several steel traps. His snow-shoes sank into the drifts as he
labored up the steep hill. All at once he stopped. The big black dog had put
his nose high in the air and had sniffed at the cold wind.
"Well, Tige, old fellow, what is it?" said Jonathan Zane, for this was he.
The dog answered with a low whine. Jonathan looked up and down the creek
valley and along the hillside, but he saw no living thing. Snow, snow
everywhere, its white monotony relieved here and there by a black tree trunk.
Betty Zane |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Kwaidan by Lafcadio Hearn: "Those servants found the mother of Riki, and told her what had happened;
and she was glad exceedingly -- for that Nanigashi house is a very rich and
famous house. But the servants said that the family of Nanigashi-Sama were
very angry about the word 'Baka' on the child's hand. 'And where is your
Riki buried?' the servants asked. 'He is buried in the cemetery of
Zendoji,' she told them. 'Please to give us some of the clay of his grave,'
they requested.
"So she went with them to the temple Zendoji, and showed them Riki's
grave; and they took some of the grave-clay away with them, wrapped up in a
furoshiki [1].... They gave Riki's mother some money,-- ten yen."... (4)
"But what did they want with that clay?" I inquired.
Kwaidan |
