| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: The ship within the islands was much more easily accounted for;
and just as we were about to rise from table he made his pronouncement.
She was, he doubted not, a ship from home lately arrived. Probably she
drew too much water to cross the bar except at the top of spring tides.
Therefore she went into that natural harbor to wait for a few days
in preference to remaining in an open roadstead.
"That's so," confirmed the second mate, suddenly, in his
slightly hoarse voice. "She draws over twenty feet.
She's the Liverpool ship Sephora with a cargo of coal.
Hundred and twenty-three days from Cardiff."
We looked at him in surprise.
The Secret Sharer |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Human Drift by Jack London: Denmark when it supported only 500 palaeolithic people. According
to Mr. Woodruff, cultivated land will produce 1600 times as much
food as hunting land. From the time of the Norman Conquest, for
centuries Europe could support no more than 25 to the square mile.
To-day Europe supports 81 to the square mile. The explanation of
this is that for the several centuries after the Norman Conquest
her population was saturated. Then, with the development of
trading and capitalism, of exploration and exploitation of new
lands, and with the invention of labour-saving machinery and the
discovery and application of scientific principles, was brought
about a tremendous increase in Europe's food-getting efficiency.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Spirit of the Border by Zane Grey: which breathed menace from the dark forests. To the settlers he was the right
arm of defense, a fitting leader for those few implacable and unerring
frontiersmen who made the settlement of the West a possibility.
And if this story of one of his relentless pursuits shows the man as he truly
was, loved by pioneers, respected and feared by redmen, and hated by
renegades; if it softens a little the ruthless name history accords him, the
writer will have been well repaid.
Z. G.
The Spirit of the Border
Chapter I.
"Nell, I'm growing powerful fond of you."
The Spirit of the Border |
