| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Heart of the West by O. Henry: know. Idaho boosted the wine-agent every time he opened his mouth; but
I wasn't so sure.
This Homer K. M., from what leaked out of his libretto through Idaho,
seemed to me to be a kind of a dog who looked at life like it was a
tin can tied to his tail. After running himself half to death, he sits
down, hangs his tongue out, and looks at the can and says:
"Oh, well, since we can't shake the growler, let's get it filled at
the corner, and all have a drink on me."
Besides that, it seems he was a Persian; and I never hear of Persia
producing anything worth mentioning unless it was Turkish rugs and
Maltese cats.
Heart of the West |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Moran of the Lady Letty by Frank Norris: the water. The Chinamen descended upon the smooth, black body,
their bare feet sliding and slipping at every step. They held on
by jabbing their knives into the hide as glacier-climbers do their
ice-picks. The head yielded barrel after barrel of oil and a fair
quantity of bone. The blubber was taken aboard the junk, minced
up with hatchets, and run into casks.
Last of all, a Chinaman cut a hole through the "case," and,
actually descending into the inside of the head, stripped away the
spermaceti (clear as crystal), and packed it into buckets, which
were hauled up on the junk's deck. The work occupied some two or
three days. During this time the "Bertha Millner" was keeled over
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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 Hellenica by Xenophon: an account of his administration in general. If there was a deficit he
made it up out of his own pocket, and when the revenues expanded he
paid himself back. For the rest, his hospitality to foreigners and his
magnificence were on a true Thessalian scale. Such was the style and
character of the man who now arrived in Lacedaemon and spoke as
follows:
[1] {pros to koinon}, "h.e. vel ad ad senatum vel ad ephoros vel ad
concionem."--Sturz, "Lex. Xen." s.v.
"Men of Lacedaemon, it is in my capacity as 'proxenos' and
'benefactor' (titles borne by my ancestry from time immemorial) that I
claim, or rather am bound, in case of any difficulty to come to you,
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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 Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed by Edna Ferber: gutter--this was not life! Life was a glorious,
beautiful thing, and I would have it yet. I laid my
plans, feverishly, and waited. He did not come back that
night, or the next, or the next, or the next. In
desperation I went to see the men at the office. No,
they had not seen him. Was there anything that they
could do? they asked. I smiled, and thanked them, and
said, oh, Peter was so absent-minded! No doubt he had
misdirected his letters, or something of the sort. And
then I went back to the flat to resume the horrible
waiting.
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