| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Paz by Honore de Balzac: "Isn't everything going on right?" asked the count, taking the
"bocchettino" of his narghile from his lips.
"Everything is going on so right that other people with an income of
two hundred thousand francs would ruin themselves by going at our
pace, and we have only one hundred and ten thousand."
So saying she pulled the bell-cord (an exquisite bit of needlework). A
footman entered, dressed like a minister.
"Tell Captain Paz that I wish to see him."
"If you think you are going to find out anything that way--" said
Comte Adam, laughing.
It is well to mention that Adam and Clementine, married in December,
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories by Alice Dunbar: between the Bayou Teche and New Orleans? Sylves' had brooded all
summer, and now that September had come, he was determined to go.
Louisette, the orphan, the girl-lover, whom everyone in Franklin
knew would some day be Ma'am Mouton's daughter-in-law, wept and
pleaded in vain. Sylves' kissed her quivering lips.
"Ma chere," he would say, "t'ink, I will bring you one fine
diamon' ring, nex' spring, when de bayou overflows again."
Louisette would fain be content with this promise. As for Ma'am
Mouton, she seemed to have grown ages older. Her Sylves' was
going from her; Sylves', whose trips to New Orleans had been a
yearly source of heart-break, was going far away for months to
The Goodness of St. Rocque and Other Stories |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Verses 1889-1896 by Rudyard Kipling: And the things I knew was rotten you said was the way to live.
For you muddled with books and pictures, an' china an' etchin's an' fans,
And your rooms at college was beastly -- more like a whore's than a man's --
Till you married that thin-flanked woman, as white and as stale as a bone,
An' she gave you your social nonsense; but where's that kid o' your own?
I've seen your carriages blocking the half o' the Cromwell Road,
But never the doctor's brougham to help the missus unload.
(So there isn't even a grandchild, an' the Gloster family's done.)
Not like your mother, she isn't. ~She~ carried her freight each run.
But they died, the pore little beggars! At sea she had 'em -- they died.
Only you, an' you stood it; you haven't stood much beside.
Verses 1889-1896 |
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 Montezuma's Daughter by H. Rider Haggard: to so many, only that I might perish miserably at last, and even in
my despair I began to hope when hope was folly; though whether this
relief was sent to me from above, or whether it was simply that
being so much alive at the moment I could not believe that I should
soon be dead, is not for me to say.
At the least my courage rose again, and I could even find heart to
note the beauty of the night. The sea was smooth as a pond, there
was no breath of wind, and now that the moon began to sink,
thousands of stars of a marvellous brightness, such as we do not
see in England, gemmed the heavens everywhere. At last these grew
pale, and dawn began to flush the east, and after it came the first
Montezuma's Daughter |
