| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Betty Zane by Zane Grey: Clarke. His face was dark with malignant hatred, as he reached for and drew an
ugly knife. There were cries of fright from the children and screams from the
women. Alfred stepped aside with the wonderful quickness of the trained boxer
and shot out his right arm. His fist caught Miller a hard blow on the head,
knocking him down and sending the knife flying in the air.
It had all happened so quickly that everyone was as if paralyzed. The settlers
stood still and watched Miller rise slowly to his feet.
"Give me my knife!" he cried hoarsely. The knife had fallen at the feet of
Major McColloch, who had concealed it with his foot.
"Let this end right here," ordered Col. Zane. "Clarke, you have made a very
strong statement. Have you anything to substantiate your words?"
Betty Zane |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Euthydemus by Plato: the Politicus, and the caricature of rhetoric in the Gorgias.
The characters of the Dialogue are easily intelligible. There is Socrates
once more in the character of an old man; and his equal in years, Crito,
the father of Critobulus, like Lysimachus in the Laches, his fellow
demesman (Apol.), to whom the scene is narrated, and who once or twice
interrupts with a remark after the manner of the interlocutor in the
Phaedo, and adds his commentary at the end; Socrates makes a playful
allusion to his money-getting habits. There is the youth Cleinias, the
grandson of Alcibiades, who may be compared with Lysis, Charmides,
Menexenus, and other ingenuous youths out of whose mouths Socrates draws
his own lessons, and to whom he always seems to stand in a kindly and
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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 The Secret Sharer by Joseph Conrad: and I hastened away from the rail to fetch some clothes.
Before entering the cabin I stood still, listening in the lobby at
the foot of the stairs. A faint snore came through the closed door
of the chief mate's room. The second mate's door was on the hook,
but the darkness in there was absolutely soundless. He, too,
was young and could sleep like a stone. Remained the steward,
but he was not likely to wake up before he was called.
I got a sleeping suit out of my room and, coming back on deck,
saw the naked man from the sea sitting on the main hatch,
glimmering white in the darkness, his elbows on his knees and his
head in his hands. In a moment he had concealed his damp body
The Secret Sharer |
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 Schoolmistress and Other Stories by Anton Chekhov: had saved opened a shop in the village, Mashutka had gone away to
Moscow with his master's family. . . .
Three years before her death she had come to see her father. He
had scarcely recognized her. She was a graceful young woman with
the manners of a young lady, and dressed like one. She talked
cleverly, as though from a book, smoked, and slept till midday.
When Andrey Andreyitch asked her what she was doing, she had
announced, looking him boldly straight in the face: "I am an
actress." Such frankness struck the former flunkey as the acme of
cynicism. Mashutka had begun boasting of her successes and her
stage life; but seeing that her father only turned crimson and
The Schoolmistress and Other Stories |
