| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from When the World Shook by H. Rider Haggard: certain spot, where it remained, while his black tail began to
wag in a delighted fashion. Bickley pushed him away and
investigated.
"As I thought," he said--"air-holes. See!"
I looked, and there, bored through the crystal of the coffin in
a line with the face of its occupant, were a number of little
holes that either by accident or design outlined the shape of a
human mouth.
"They are not airtight," murmured Bickley; "and if air can
enter, how can dead flesh remain like that for ages?"
Then he continued his search upon the other side.
When the World Shook |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy: quite unmanned him; and in pursuance of his plan of not
showing himself in Casterbridge street till evening, lest he
should mortify Farfrae and his bride, he alighted here, with
his bundle and bird-cage, and was soon left as a lonely
figure on the broad white highway.
It was the hill near which he had waited to meet Farfrae,
almost two years earlier, to tell him of the serious illness
of his wife Lucetta. The place was unchanged; the same
larches sighed the same notes; but Farfrae had another wife--
and, as Henchard knew, a better one. He only hoped that
Elizabeth-Jane had obtained a better home than had been hers
The Mayor of Casterbridge |
| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Message by Honore de Balzac: ferocious hunger familiar to convalescents, sheer animal
appetite, had overpowered all human sensibilities. In that little
space I had seen frank and undisguised human nature under two
very different aspects, in such a sort that there was a certain
grotesque element in the very midst of a most terrible tragedy.
The evening that followed was dreary. I was tired. The canon
racked his brains to discover a reason for his niece's tears. The
lady's husband silently digested his dinner; content, apparently,
with the Countess' rather vague explanation, sent through the
maid, putting forward some feminine ailment as her excuse. We all
went early to bed.
|
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 The Spirit of the Border by Zane Grey: Crack!
All heard the shot of a rifle; all noticed the difference between its clear,
ringing intonation and the loud reports of the other two. All distinctly heard
the zip of a bullet as it whistled over their heads.
All? No, not all. One did not hear that speeding bullet. He who was the
central figure in this tragic scene, he who had doomed the Christians might
have seen that tiny puff of smoke which heralded his own doom, but before the
ringing report could reach his ears a small blue hole appeared, as if by
magic, over his left eye, and pulse, and sense, and life had fled forever.
Half King, great, cruel chieftain, stood still for an instant as if he had
been an image of stone; his haughty head lost its erect poise, the fierceness
The Spirit of the Border |
