| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from Georgics by Virgil: Rivers and parched banks and sloping heights.
At last in crowds she slaughters them, she chokes
The very stalls with carrion-heaps that rot
In hideous corruption, till men learn
With earth to cover them, in pits to hide.
For e'en the fells are useless; nor the flesh
With water may they purge, or tame with fire,
Nor shear the fleeces even, gnawed through and through
With foul disease, nor touch the putrid webs;
But, had one dared the loathly weeds to try,
Red blisters and an unclean sweat o'erran
Georgics |
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 Montezuma's Daughter by H. Rider Haggard: brothers, Montezuma's sons whom the Spaniards held in hostage,
perished with them in the fray.
As for de Garcia I could not learn what had become of him, nor
whether he was dead or living.
CHAPTER XXV
THE BURYING OF MONTEZUMA'S TREASURE
Cuitlahua was crowned Emperor of the Aztecs in succession to his
brother Montezuma, while I lay sick with the wound given me by the
sword of de Garcia, and also with that which I had received on the
altar of sacrifice. This hurt had found no time to heal, and in
the fierce fighting on the Night of Fear it burst open and bled
Montezuma's Daughter |
