| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from In a German Pension by Katherine Mansfield: touched at throat and wrists with white frilling. Her brown hair, braided,
was tied with a black bow--unusually pale, with a small mole on her left
cheek.
"I am the Baroness von Gall's sister," she said, trying the pen on a piece
of blotting-paper, and smiling at us deprecatingly. Even for the most
jaded of us life holds its thrilling moments. Two Baronesses in two
months! The manager immediately left the room to find a new nib.
To my plebeian eyes that afflicted child was singularly unattractive. She
had the air of having been perpetually washed with a blue bag, and hair
like grey wool--dressed, too, in a pinafore so stiffly starched that she
could only peer at us over the frill of it--a social barrier of a
|
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 War of the Worlds by H. G. Wells: the situation was of the strangest and gravest description, but
the public was exhorted to avoid and discourage panic. No
doubt the Martians were strange and terrible in the extreme,
but at the outside there could not be more than twenty of
them against our millions.
The authorities had reason to suppose, from the size of the
cylinders, that at the outside there could not be more than
five in each cylinder--fifteen altogether. And one at least was
disposed of--perhaps more. The public would be fairly
warned of the approach of danger, and elaborate measures
were being taken for the protection of the people in the
War of the Worlds |
