| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from At the Mountains of Madness by H. P. Lovecraft: that the then missing Gedney was in no way responsible for the
loathsome horrors we found. I have said that the bodies were frightfully
mangled. Now I must add that some were incised and subtracted
from in the most curious, cold-blooded, and inhuman fashion. It
was the same with dogs and men. All the healthier, fatter bodies,
quadrupedal or bipedal, had had their most solid masses of tissue
cut out and removed, as by a careful butcher; and around them
was a strange sprinkling of salt - taken from the ravaged provision
chests on the planes - which conjured up the most horrible associations.
The thing had occurred in one of the crude aeroplane shelters
from which the plane had been dragged out, and subsequent winds
At the Mountains of Madness |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Westward Ho! by Charles Kingsley: supposed, wanted a present, he might have all her Mexican feather-
dresses; she would not wear them--they were wild Indian things, and
she was an English maid--but they would just do for a Piache; and
so darted upstairs, brought them down, and insisted so stoutly on
arraying the vicar therein, that the good man beat a swift retreat.
But he carried off with him, nevertheless, one of the handsomest
mantles, which, instead of selling it, he converted cleverly enough
into an altar-cloth; and for several years afterwards, the
communion at Northam was celebrated upon a blaze of emerald, azure,
and crimson, which had once adorned the sinful body of some Aztec
prince.
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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 Sylvie and Bruno by Lewis Carroll: with her arms round his neck!
I had not the heart to make the dear little fellow go through his
troubles a second time, so hastily begged the Professor to push the
hands round into their former position. In a moment Sylvie and Bruno
were gone again, and I could just see them in the far distance, picking
'dindledums.'
"Wonderful, indeed!" I exclaimed.
"It has another property, yet more wonderful," said the Professor.
"You see this little peg? That is called the 'Reversal Peg.' If you
push it in, the events of the next hour happen in the reverse order.
Do not try it now. I will lend you the Watch for a few days, and you
Sylvie and Bruno |
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 Ursula by Honore de Balzac: spirits the most refined), came to understand that her godfather did
not believe in a future life, nor in the immortality of the soul, nor
in providence, nor in God. Pressed with questions by the innocent
creature, the doctor was unable to hide the fatal secret. Ursula's
artless consternation made him smile, but when he saw her depressed
and sad he felt how deep an affection her sadness revealed. Absolute
devotion has a horror of every sort of disagreement, even in ideas
which it does not share. Sometimes the doctor accepted his darling's
reasonings as he would her kisses, said as they were in the sweetest
of voices with the purest and most fervent feeling. Believers and
unbelievers speak different languages and cannot understand each
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