| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Nada the Lily by H. Rider Haggard: my mother fell down and died, and I cried very much, for I loved her,
and it was dreadful to see her cold and stiff, with not a word to say
however loudly I called to her. Well, they buried my mother, and she
was soon forgotten. I only remembered her, nobody else did--not even
Baleka, for she was too little--and as for my father he took another
young wife and was content. After that I was unhappy, for my brothers
did not love me, because I was much cleverer than they, and had
greater skill with the assegai, and was swifter in running; so they
poisoned the mind of my father against me and he treated me badly. But
Baleka and I loved each other, for we were both lonely, and she clung
to me like a creeper to the only tree in a plain, and though I was
Nada the Lily |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from A Legend of Montrose by Walter Scott: student of Mareschal-College, is entirely original; and the
mixture of talent, selfishness, courage, coarseness, and conceit,
was never so happily exemplified. Numerous as his speeches are,
there is not one that is not characteristic--and, to our taste,
divertingly ludicrous."
POSTSCRIPT.
While these pages were passing through the press, the author
received a letter from the present Robert Stewart of Ardvoirlich,
favouring him with the account of the unhappy slaughter of Lord
Kilpont, differing from, and more probable than, that given by
Bishop Wishart, whose narrative infers either insanity or the
|
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Manon Lescaut by Abbe Prevost: equally good.
"I immediately set about devising the means of procuring my
liberty. There certainly had been nothing actually criminal in
my conduct; and supposing even that our felonious intention was
established by the evidence of Marcel, I knew that criminal
intentions alone were not punishable. I resolved to write
immediately to my father, and beg of him to come himself to
Paris. I felt much less humiliation, as I have already said, in
being in Le Chatelet than in St. Lazare. Besides, although I
preserved, all proper respect for the paternal authority, age and
experience had considerably lessened my timidity. I wrote, and
|
