| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: been leading for nine weeks, anybody would have got out of condition.
I wasn't capable of swimming round as far as your rudder chains.
And, lo and behold! there was a ladder to get hold of.
After I gripped it I said to myself, `What's the good?'
When I saw a man's head looking over I thought I would swim away
presently and leave him shouting--in whatever language it was.
I didn't mind being looked at. I--I liked it. And then you speaking to me
so quietly--as if you had expected me--made me hold on a little longer.
It had been a confounded lonely time--I don't mean while swimming.
I was glad to talk a little to somebody that didn't belong to the Sephora.
As to asking for the captain, that was a mere impulse. It could
The Secret Sharer |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Summer by Edith Wharton: that he was wondering how much she knew of his reasons
for going.
"I presume you found your work was over quicker
than what you expected," she said.
"Well, yes--that is, no: there are plenty of things I
should have liked to do. But my holiday's limited; and
now that Mr. Royall needs the horse for himself it's
rather difficult to find means of getting about."
"There ain't any too many teams for hire around here,"
she acquiesced; and there was another silence.
"These days here have been--awfully pleasant: I wanted
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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 On Horsemanship by Xenophon: cit. p. 126).
The human subject would seem to point to this conclusion. When a man
wants to lift anything from off the ground he essays to do so by
bringing the legs apart and not by bringing them together.
A horse ought not to have large testicles, though that is not a point
to be determined in the colt.
And now, as regards the lower parts, the hocks,[31] or shanks and
fetlocks and hoofs, we have only to repeat what has been said already
about those of the fore-legs.
[31] {ton katothen astragelon, e knemon}, lit. "the under (or hinder?)
knuckle-bones (hocks?) or shins"; i.e. anatomically speaking, the
On Horsemanship |
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 Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin: only six persons out of twenty-one recognized it,--that is,
if we accept such terms as "grief," "misery," "annoyance,"
as correct;--whereas, fifteen persons were ludicrously mistaken;
some of them saying the face expressed "fun," "satisfaction,"
"cunning," "disgust," &c. We may infer from this that there
is something wrong in the expression. Some of the fifteen
persons may, however, have been partly misled by not expecting
to see an old man crying, and by tears not being secreted.
With respect to another figure by Dr. Duchenne (fig. 49), in which
the muscles of half the face are galvanized in order to represent
a man beginning to cry, with the eyebrow on the same side
Expression of Emotion in Man and Animals |
