| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Captain Stormfield by Mark Twain: plain clothes. But they ain't to FLY with! The wings are for
show, not for use. Old experienced angels are like officers of the
regular army - they dress plain, when they are off duty. New
angels are like the militia - never shed the uniform - always
fluttering and floundering around in their wings, butting people
down, flapping here, and there, and everywhere, always imagining
they are attracting the admiring eye - well, they just think they
are the very most important people in heaven. And when you see one
of them come sailing around with one wing tipped up and t'other
down, you make up your mind he is saying to himself: 'I wish Mary
Ann in Arkansaw could see me now. I reckon she'd wish she hadn't
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Tales and Fantasies by Robert Louis Stevenson: things, and of one thing in particular: that the police were
after him. Two months had come and gone before the
convalescent in the Sacramento hospital was identified with
Kirkman, the absconding San Francisco clerk; even then, there
must elapse nearly a fortnight more till the perfect stranger
could be hunted up, the portmanteau recovered, and John's
letter carried at length to its destination, the seal still
unbroken, the inclosure still intact.
Meanwhile, John had gone upon his holidays without a word,
which was irregular; and there had disappeared with him a
certain sum of money, which was out of all bounds of
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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 A Daughter of Eve by Honore de Balzac: sacrifice had circulated among the audience.
"I'd rather be applauded for my talent," said her rival in the green-
room.
"A natural desire in an actress who has never been applauded at all,"
remarked Florine.
During the evening Florine's maid installed her in Raoul's apartment
in the Passage Sandrie. Raoul himself was to encamp in the house where
the office of the new journal was established.
Such was the rival of the innocent Madame de Vandenesse. Raoul was the
connecting link between the actress and the countess,--a knot severed
by a duchess in the days of Louis XV. by the poisoning of Adrienne
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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 When the World Shook by H. Rider Haggard: the local tongues.
As it chanced, too, at Perth we picked up a Samoan and his wife
who, under some of the "white Australia" regulations, were not
allowed to remain in the country and offered to work as servants
in return for a passage to Apia where we proposed to call some
time or other. With these people Bastin and Bickley talked all
day long till really they became fairly proficient in their soft
and beautiful dialect. They wished me to learn also, but I said
that with two such excellent interpreters and the natives while
they remained with us, it seemed quite unnecessary. Still, I
picked up a good deal in a quiet way, as much as they did
When the World Shook |
