| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from Moby Dick by Herman Melville: in thickness; for the bottom of the whale-boat is like critical ice,
which will bear up a considerable distributed weight, but not very
much of a concentrated one. When the painted canvas cover is clapped
on the American line-tub, the boat looks as if it were pulling off
with a prodigious great wedding-cake to present to the whales.
Both ends of the line are exposed; the lower end terminating in an
eye-splice or loop coming up from the bottom against the side of the
tub, and hanging over its edge completely disengaged from everything.
This arrangement of the lower end is necessary on two accounts.
First: In order to facilitate the fastening to it of an additional
line from a neighboring boat, in case the stricken whale should sound
Moby Dick |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Ballads by Robert Louis Stevenson: And a moment shook in his purpose.
But these were the foes of his clan,
And he trod upon pity, and came, and civilly greeted the king,
And gravely entreated Rahero; and for all that could fight or sing,
And claimed a name in the land, had fitting phrases of praise;
But with all who were well-descended he spoke of the ancient days.
And "'Tis true," said he, "that in Paea the victual rots on the ground;
But, friends, your number is many; and pigs must be hunted and found,
And the lads troop to the mountains to bring the feis down,
And around the bowls of the kava cluster the maids of the town.
So, for to-night, sleep here; but king, common, and priest
Ballads |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Modeste Mignon by Honore de Balzac: of his fate,--to her as adventurous and perilous as the exile to
Siberia. But the grief which was dragging her to the grave was far
other than these visible sorrows. The caustic that was slowly eating
into her heart lay beneath a stone in the little graveyard of
Ingouville, on which was inscribed:--
BETTINA CAROLINE MIGNON
Died aged twenty-two.
Pray for her.
This inscription is to the young girl whom it covered what many
another epitaph has been for the dead lying beneath them,--a table of
contents to a hidden book. Here is the book, in its dreadful brevity;
Modeste Mignon |
