| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Marie by H. Rider Haggard: he must not kill an Englishman, and therefore he wished to spare me,
although one of your people, Hernan Pereira, had whispered to him that I
ought to be killed. Yet I say outright that I think you are foolish to
visit this king with so large a force. Still, I am ready to do so
myself with one or two others. Let me go, then, and try to persuade him
to sign this treaty as to the land. If I am killed or fail, you can
follow after me and do better."
"Allemachte!" exclaimed Retief; "that is a fair offer. But how do I
know, nephew, that when we came to read the treaty we should not find
that it granted all the land to you English and not to us Boers? No,
no, don't look angry. That was not a right thing to say, for you are
Marie |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Fantastic Fables by Ambrose Bierce: that if I permit one of those noisy creatures to come into my
presence I am likely to forget myself and do him an injury."
The Kite, the Pigeons, and the Hawk
SOME Pigeons exposed to the attacks of a Kite asked a Hawk to
defend them. He consented, and being admitted into the cote waited
for the Kite, whom he fell upon and devoured. When he was so
surfeited that he could scarcely move, the grateful Pigeons
scratched out his eyes.
The Wolf and the Babe
A FAMISHING Wolf, passing the door of a cottage in the forest,
heard a Mother say to her babe:
Fantastic Fables |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Ballads by Robert Louis Stevenson: Then was an aito dispatched and came with fire in his hand,
And Hiopa took it. - "Within," said he, "is the life of a land;
And behold! I breathe on the coal, I breathe on the dales of the east,
And silence falls on forest and shore; the voice of the feast
Is quenched, and the smoke of cooking; the rooftree decays and falls
On the empty lodge, and the winds subvert deserted walls."
Therewithal, to the fuel, he laid the glowing coal;
And the redness ran in the mass and burrowed within like a mole,
And copious smoke was conceived. But, as when a dam is to burst,
The water lips it and crosses in silver trickles at first,
And then, of a sudden, whelms and bears it away forthright:
Ballads |
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 The Life of the Spider by J. Henri Fabre: to music, the only efficacious remedy, so they tell us. Special
tunes have been noted, those quickest to afford relief. There is
medical choreography, medical music. And have we not the
tarentella, a lively and nimble dance, bequeathed to us perhaps by
the healing art of the Calabrian peasant?
Must we take these queer things seriously or laugh at them? From
the little that I have seen, I hesitate to pronounce an opinion.
Nothing tells us that the bite of the Tarantula may not provoke, in
weak and very impressionable people, a nervous disorder which music
will relieve; nothing tells us that a profuse perspiration,
resulting from a very energetic dance, is not likely to diminish
The Life of the Spider |
