| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Memoir of Fleeming Jenkin by Robert Louis Stevenson: weather, though I was by no means of opinion that the slight sea
and wind had been the cause of our failures. - All next day
(Monday) we lay off Siphano, amusing ourselves on shore with
fowling pieces and navy revolvers. I need not say we killed
nothing; and luckily we did not wound any of ourselves. A
guardiano accompanied us, his functions being limited to preventing
actual contact with the natives, for they might come as near and
talk as much as they pleased. These isles of Greece are sad,
interesting places. They are not really barren all over, but they
are quite destitute of verdure; and tufts of thyme, wild mastic or
mint, though they sound well, are not nearly so pretty as grass.
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Buttered Side Down by Edna Ferber: at many things, but always with a loving eye on Miss Gussie Fink.
Then one wild night there had been a waiters' strike--wages or
hours or tips or all three. In the confusion that followed Heiny
had been pressed into service and a chopped coat. He had fitted
into both with unbelievable nicety, proving that waiters are born,
not made. Those little tricks and foibles that are characteristic
of the genus waiter seemed to envelop him as though a fairy garment
had fallen upon his shoulders. The folded napkin under his left
arm seemed to have been placed there by nature, so perfectly did it
fit into place. The ghostly tread, the little whisking skip, the
half-simper, the deferential bend that had in it at the same time
Buttered Side Down |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Little Rivers by Henry van Dyke: Our next day's journey was long and variegated. A portage of a
mile or two across the Ile d'Alma, with a cart to haul our canoes
and stuff, brought us to the Little Discharge, down which we
floated for a little way, and then hauled through the village of
St. Joseph to the foot of the Carcajou, or Wildcat Falls. A mile
of quick water was soon passed, and we came to the junction of the
Little Discharge with the Grand Discharge at the point where the
picturesque club-house stands in a grove of birches beside the big
Vache Caille Falls. It is lively work crossing the pool here, when
the water is high and the canoes are heavy; but we went through the
labouring seas safely, and landed some distance below, at the head
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