| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Roads of Destiny by O. Henry: into the eyes of gourmets. The service was swift, silent, lavish, as
in the days when the waiters were assets like the plate. The names by
which the planter's family and their visitors addressed one another
were historic in the annals of two nations. Their manners and
conversation had that most difficult kind of ease--the kind that still
preserves punctilio. The planter himself seemed to be the dynamo that
generated the larger portion of the gaiety and wit. The younger ones
at the board found it more than difficult to turn back on him his guns
of raillery and banter. It is true, the young men attempted to storm
his works repeatedly, incited by the hope of gaining the approbation
of their fair companions; but even when they sped a well-aimed shaft,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Bucky O'Connor by William MacLeod Raine: "No, did I? Ce'tainly an accident. The nigger must have been in
my way as I climbed into the car. Took the kink out of his hair,
you say? Here, Sam!" He tossed a bill to the porter, who was
rolling affronted eyes at him. "Do you reckon this is big enough
to plaster your injured feelings, boy?"
The white smile flashed at him by the porter was a receipt for
indemnity paid in full.
Sheriff Collins' perception of his neighbor across the aisle was
more frank in its interest than the girl's had been of him. The
level, fearless gaze of the outdoors West looked at her
unabashed, appreciating swiftly her points as they impinged
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Ferragus by Honore de Balzac: anger, to roar with impatience, to freeze our feet in the mud, to be
numbed, and roasted, and torn by false hopes. We must go, on the faith
of a mere indication, to a vague object, miss our end, curse our luck,
improvise to ourselves elegies, dithyrambics, exclaim idiotically
before inoffensive pedestrians who observe us, knock over old apple-
women and their baskets, run hither and thither, stand on guard
beneath a window, make a thousand suppositions. But, after all, it is
a chase, a hunt; a hunt in Paris, a hunt with all its chances, minus
dogs and guns and the tally-ho! Nothing compares with it but the life
of gamblers. But it needs a heart big with love and vengeance to
ambush itself in Paris, like a tiger waiting to spring upon its prey,
Ferragus |
