| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Kenilworth by Walter Scott: attendants; so that, unless when there were followers of the
Earl, or of Varney, in the mansion, one old male domestic, and
two aged crones, who assisted in keeping the Countess's
apartments in order, were the only servants of the family.
It was one of these old women who opened the door when Wayland
knocked, and answered his petition, to be admitted to exhibit his
wares to the ladies of the family, with a volley of vituperation,
couched in what is there called the JOWRING dialect. The pedlar
found the means of checking this vociferation by slipping a
silver groat into her hand, and intimating the present of some
stuff for a coif, if the lady would buy of his wares.
Kenilworth |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Myths and Myth-Makers by John Fiske: Welsh or the Egyptian legend as a copy of the other. Obviously
the conclusion is forced upon us that the stories, like the
words, are related collaterally, having descended from a
common ancestral legend, or having been suggested by one and
the same primeval idea.
[3] According to Mr. Isaac Taylor, the name is really derived
from "St. Celert, a Welsh saint of the fifth century, to whom
the church of Llangeller is consecrated." (Words and Places,
p. 339.)
[4] Compare Krilof's story of the Gnat and the Shepherd, in
Mr. Ralston's excellent version, Krilof and his Fables, p.
Myths and Myth-Makers |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from O Pioneers! by Willa Cather: to bury him. Our landlady and the delicatessen
man are our mourners, and we leave nothing
behind us but a frock-coat and a fiddle, or an
easel, or a typewriter, or whatever tool we got
our living by. All we have ever managed to
do is to pay our rent, the exorbitant rent that
one has to pay for a few square feet of space
near the heart of things. We have no house,
no place, no people of our own. We live in
the streets, in the parks, in the theatres. We sit
in restaurants and concert halls and look about
O Pioneers! |
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 Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen: to be shown into the common drawing-room, and capable
of considering where she was.
An abbey! Yes, it was delightful to be really
in an abbey! But she doubted, as she looked round
the room, whether anything within her observation would
have given her the consciousness. The furniture was
in all the profusion and elegance of modern taste.
The fireplace, where she had expected the ample width
and ponderous carving of former times, was contracted
to a Rumford, with slabs of plain though handsome marble,
and ornaments over it of the prettiest English china.
Northanger Abbey |
