| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Tom Grogan by F. Hopkinson Smith: dip'thery. The Big Gray Cully's drivin' over there--the one
that's a-hoistin'--ain't fit to be out of the stables. If ye
weren't behind in the work, he'd have two blankets on him this
minute. But I'm here meself now, and I'll have her out to-night
if I work till daylight. Here, cap'n, pull yerself together.
This is the boss."
Then catching sight of the boy turning a handspring behind the
horse, she called out again:--
"Now, look here, Cully, none of your skylarkin'. There's the
dinner whistle. Unhitch the Big Gray; he's as dry as a bone."
The boy loosened the traces and led the horse to water, and
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Long Odds by H. Rider Haggard: eyes fixed upon the reeds. The fire was burning like a furnace now; the
flames crackling and roaring as they bit into the reeds, sending spouts
of fire twenty feet and more into the air, and making the hot air dance
above in a way that was perfectly dazzling. But the reeds were still
half green, and created an enormous quantity of smoke, which came
rolling towards me like a curtain, lying very low on account of the
wind. Presently, above the crackling of the fire, I heard a startled
roar, then another and another. So the lions were at home.
"I was beginning to get excited now, for, as you fellows know, there is
nothing in experience to warm up your nerves like a lion at close
quarters, unless it is a wounded buffalo; and I became still more so
Long Odds |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from From the Earth to the Moon by Jules Verne: savants, would doubtless give rise to many theories favorable
to the grave question of the habitability of the moon.
Barbicane allowed himself to be carried away by these reflections.
He forgot himself in a deep reverie in which the mysterious
destiny of the lunar world was uppermost. He was seeking to
combine together the facts observed up to that time, when a new
incident recalled him briskly to reality. This incident was more
than a cosmical phenomenon; it was a threatened danger, the
consequence of which might be disastrous in the extreme.
Suddenly, in the midst of the ether, in the profound darkness, an
enormous mass appeared. It was like a moon, but an incandescent
From the Earth to the Moon |
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 Enoch Arden, &c. by Alfred Tennyson: What lovelier of his own had he than her,
His only child, his Edith, whom he loved
As heiress and not heir regretfully?
But `he that marries her marries her name'
This fiat somewhat soothed himself and wife,
His wife a faded beauty of the Baths,
Insipid as the Queen upon a card;
Her all of thought and bearing hardly more
Than his own shadow in a sickly sun.
A land of hops and poppy-mingled corn,
Little about it stirring save a brook!
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