| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Long Odds by H. Rider Haggard: to finish if you hit him anywhere in the body. A buck takes far more
killing.
"Well, I started, and the first thing I set to work to do was to try to
discover whereabouts the brutes lay up for the day. About three hundred
yards from the waggon was the crest of a rise covered with single mimosa
trees, dotted about in a park-like fashion, and beyond this lay a
stretch of open plain running down to a dry pan, or water-hole, which
covered about an acre of ground, and was densely clothed with reeds, now
in the sere and yellow leaf. From the further edge of this pan the
ground sloped up again to a great cleft, or nullah, which had been cut
out by the action of the water, and was pretty thickly sprinkled with
Long Odds |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Familiar Studies of Men and Books by Robert Louis Stevenson: For there are delicacies, eternal between persons of the same
sex, which are melted and disappear in the warmth of love.
To both, if they are to be right, he attributes the same
nature and condition. "We are not what we are," says he,
"nor do we treat or esteem each other for such, but for what
we are capable of being." "A friend is one who incessantly
pays us the compliment of expecting all the virtues from us,
and who can appreciate them in us." "The friend asks no
return but that his friend will religiously accept and wear
and not disgrace his apotheosis of him." "It is the merit
and preservation of friendship that it takes place on a level
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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 The Complete Poems of Longfellow by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: In the chapter with this title in Outre-Mer, besides
Illustrations from Byron and Lockhart are the three following
examples,
contributed by Mr. Longfellow.
I
Rio Verde, Rio Verde!
Many a corpse is bathed in thee,
Both of Moors and eke of Christians,
Slain with swords most cruelly.
And thy pure and crystal waters
Dappled are with crimson gore;
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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 Mansfield Park by Jane Austen: the liking to make girls a little in love with him, is not
half so dangerous to a wife's happiness as a tendency to fall
in love himself, which he has never been addicted to.
And I do seriously and truly believe that he is attached
to you in a way that he never was to any woman before;
that he loves you with all his heart, and will love you
as nearly for ever as possible. If any man ever loved
a woman for ever, I think Henry will do as much for you."
Fanny could not avoid a faint smile, but had nothing
to say.
"I cannot imagine Henry ever to have been happier,"
Mansfield Park |
