| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Human Drift by Jack London: interrogation mark, pointing all the while from the mangy leopard
skin to the many shops I had sketched.
But the proprietor failed to follow me. So did his assistant.
The street came in to help--that is, as many as could crowd into
the six-by-eight shop; while those that could not force their way
in held an overflow meeting on the sidewalk. The proprietor and
the rest took turns at talking to me in rapid-fire Spanish, and,
from the expressions on their faces, all concluded that I was
remarkably stupid. Again I went through my programme, pointing on
the sketch from the one shop to the many shops, pointing out that
in this particular shop was one leopard skin, and then questing
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Weir of Hermiston by Robert Louis Stevenson: his furtive business, speeding home, perhaps, with a paltry booty of
lame horses and lean kine, or squealing and dealing death in some
moorland feud of the ferrets and the wild cats. One after another
closed his obscure adventures in mid-air, triced up to the arm of the
royal gibbet or the Baron's dule-tree. For the rusty blunderbuss of
Scots criminal justice, which usually hurt nobody but jurymen, became a
weapon of precision for the Nicksons, the Ellwalds, and the Crozers.
The exhilaration of their exploits seemed to haunt the memories of their
descendants alone, and the shame to be forgotten. Pride glowed in their
bosoms to publish their relationship to "Andrew Ellwald of the
Laverockstanes, called `Unchancy Dand,' who was justifeed wi' seeven
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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 McTeague by Frank Norris: footboard of the bed. She saw his red, congested face;
the huge mouth wide open; his unclean shirt, with its frayed
wristbands; and his huge feet encased in thick woollen
socks. Then her grief and the sense of her unhappiness
returned more poignant than ever. She stretched her arms
out in front of her on her work-table, and, burying her face
in them, cried and sobbed as though her heart would break.
The rain continued. The panes of the single window ran with
sheets of water; the eaves dripped incessantly. It grew
darker. The tiny, grimy room, full of the smells of cooking
and of "non-poisonous" paint, took on an aspect of
McTeague |
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 Love and Friendship by Jane Austen: Knight and myself, who was abandoned by her son, confined by her
Cousin, abused, reproached and vilified by all, what must not her
most noble mind have suffered when informed that Elizabeth had
given orders for her Death! Yet she bore it with a most unshaken
fortitude, firm in her mind; constant in her Religion; and
prepared herself to meet the cruel fate to which she was doomed,
with a magnanimity that would alone proceed from conscious
Innocence. And yet could you Reader have beleived it possible
that some hardened and zealous Protestants have even abused her
for that steadfastness in the Catholic Religion which reflected
on her so much credit? But this is a striking proof of THEIR
Love and Friendship |
