Chapter V: The Voice. (46)

PITCH AND COMPASS.

The natural pitch of the voice is its keynote, or governing note. It is that on which the voice usually dwells, and to which it most frequently returns when wearied. It is also the pitch used in conversation, and the one which a reader or speaker naturally adopts--when he reads or speaks-- most easily and agreeably.

The compass of the voice is its range above and below this pitch. To avoid monotony in reading or speaking, the voice should rise above or fall below this keynote, but always with reference to the sense or character of that which is read or spoken. The proper natural pitch is that above and below which there is most room for variation.

To strengthen the voice and increase its compass, select a short sentence, repeat it several times in succession in as low a key as the voice can sound naturally; then rise one note higher, and practice on that key, then another, and so on, until the highest pitch of the voice has been reached. Next, reverse the process, until the lowest pitch has been reached.

EXAMPLES IN PITCH (46)

High Pitch.

NOTE.--Be careful to distinguish pitch from power in the following exercise. Speaking in the open air, at the very top of the voice, is an exercise admirably adapted to strengthen the voice and give it compass, and should be frequently practiced.

1. Charge'! Chester" charge'! On'! Stanley, on'!

2. A horse'! a horse'! my kingdom' for a horse'!

3. Jump far out', boy' into the wave'!
Jump', or I fire'!

4. Run'! run'! run for your lives!

5. Fire'! fire'! fire'! Ring the bell'!

6. Gentlemen may cry peace'! peace'! but there is no peace!

7. Rouse' ye Romans! rouse' ye slaves'!
Have ye brave sons'? Look in the next fierce brawl
To see them die'. Have ye fair daughters'? Look
To see them live, torn from your arms', distained',
Dishonored', and if ye dare call for justice',
Be answered by the lash'!

Medium Pitch. (47)

NOTE.--This is the pitch in which we converse. To strengthen it, we should read or speak in it as loud as possible, without rising to a higher key. To do this requires long-continued practice.

1. Under a spreading chestnut tree,
The village smithy stands';
The smith, a mighty man is he,
With large and sinewy hands';
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.

2. There is something in the thunder's voice that makes me tremble like a child. I have tried to conquer' this unmanly weakness'. I have called pride' to my aid'; I have sought for moral courage in the lessons of philosophy', but it avails me nothing'. At the first moaning of the distant cloud, my heart shrinks and dies within me.

3. He taught the scholars the Rule of Three',
Reading, and writing, and history', too';
He took the little ones on his knee',
For a kind old heart in his breast had he',
And the wants of the littlest child he knew'.
"Learn while you're young'," he often said',
"There is much to enjoy down here below';
Life for the living', and rest for the dead',"
Said the jolly old pedagogue' long ago'.

Low Pitch. (48)

1. O, proper stuff!
This is the very painting of your fear:
This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said,
Led you to Duncan. O, these flaws and starts,
Impostors to true fear, would well become
A woman's story at a winter's fire.
Authorized by her grandam.

2. Thou slave! thou wretch! thou coward!
Thou little valiant, great in villainy!
Thou ever strong upon the stronger side!
Thou fortune's champion, thou dost never fight
But when her humorous ladyship is by
To teach thee safety! Thou art perjured too,
And sooth'st up greatness. What a fool art thou,
A ramping fool; to brag, and stamp, and sweat,
Upon my party! thou cold-blooded slave!

3. God! thou art mighty! At thy footstool bound,
Lie, gazing to thee, Chance, and Life, and Death;
Nor in the angel circle flaming round,
Nor in the million worlds that blaze beneath,
Is one that can withstand thy wrath's hot breath.
Woe, in thy frown: in thy smile, victory:
Hear my last prayer! I ask no mortal wreath;
Let but these eyes my rescued country see,
Then take my spirit, all Omnipotent, to thee.

4. O Thou eternal One! whose presence bright
All space doth occupy, all motion guide,
Unchanged through time's all-devastating blight!
Thou only God, there is no god beside!
Being above all things, mighty One,
Whom none can comprehend and none explore;
Who fill'st existence with thyself alone,--
Embracing all, supporting, ruling o'er,--
Being whom we call God, and know no more!

QUANTITY AND QUALITY. (49)

Quantity, in reading and speaking, means the length of time occupied in uttering a syllable or a word. Sounds and syllables vary greatly in quantity. Some are long, some short, and others intermediate between those which are long or short. Some sounds, also, may be prolonged or shortened in utterance to any desired extent. Quantity may be classified as Long, Medium, or Short.

DIRECTIONS FOR PRACTICE ON LONG QUANTITY.--Select some word of one syllable ending with a long vocal or a subvocal sound; pronounce it many times in succession, increasing the quantity at each repetition, until you can dwell upon it any desired length of time, without drawling, and in a natural tone.

REMARK.--Practice in accordance with this direction will enable the pupil to secure that fullness and roundness of voice which is exemplified in the hailing of a ship, "ship aho--y;" in the reply of the sailor, when, in the roar of the storm, he answers his captain, "ay--e. ay--e;" and in the command of the officer to his troops, when, amid the thunder of artillery, he gives the order, "ma--rch," or "ha--lt."

This fullness or roundness of tone is secured, by dwelling on the vocal sound, and indefinitely protracting it, The mouth should be opened wide, the tongue kept down, and the aperture left as round and as free for the voice as possible.

It is this artificial rotundity which, in connection with a distinct articulation, enables one who speaks in the open air, or in a very large apartment, to send his voice to the most distant point. It is a certain degree of this quality, which distinguishes declamatory or public speaking or reading from private conversation, and no one can accomplish much, as a public speaker, without cultivating it. It must be carefully distinguished from the "high tone," which is an elevation of pitch, and from "loudness." or "strength" of voice.

It will be observed that clearness and distinctness of utterance are secured by a proper use of the subvocals and aspirates--these sounds giving to words their shape, as it were; but a clear, full, and well-modulated utterance of the vocals gives to words their fullness.

LONG QUANTITY. (49)

1. Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny is dead!

2. Woe, woe, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem!

3. O righteous Heaven! ere Freedom found a grave,
Why slept the sword, omnipotent to save?
Where was thine arm, O Vengeance! where thy rod,
That smote the foes of Zion and of God?

4. O sailor boy! sailor boy! never again
Shall home, love, or kindred thy wishes repay;
Unblessed and unhonored, down deep in the main,
Full many a fathom, thy frame shall decay.

5. O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth! who hast set thy glory above the heavens! When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers; the moon and the stars, which thou hast ordained; what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him? For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor. Thou madest him to have dominion over the work of thy hands; thou hast put all things under his feet. O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is thy name in all the earth!

MEDIUM QUANTITY. (50)

1. Between Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose;
The spectacles set them, unhappily, wrong;
The point in dispute was, as all the world knows,
To which the said spectacles ought to belong.

2. Bird of the broad and sweeping wing!
Thy home is high in heaven,
Where the wide storms their banners fling,
And the tempest clouds are driven.

3. At midnight, in his guarded tent,
The Turk lay dreaming of the hour
When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent,
Should tremble at his power.

4. On New Year's night, an old man stood at his window, and looked, with a glance of fearful despair, up the immovable, unfading heaven, and down upon the still, pure, white earth, on which no one was now so joyless and sleepless as he.

SHORT QUANTITY. (51)

1. Quick! or he faints! stand with the cordial near!

2. Back to thy punishment, false fugitive!

3. Fret till your proud heart breaks! Must I observe you? Must I crouch beneath your testy humor?

4. Up drawbridge, grooms! what, warder, ho!
Let the portcullis fall!

5. Quick, man the lifeboat! see yon bark,
That drives before the blast!
There's a rock ahead, the fog is dark,
And the storm comes thick and fast.

6. I am at liberty, like every other man, to use my own language; and though, perhaps, I may have some ambition to please this gentleman, I shall not by myself under any restraint, nor very solicitously copy his diction, or his mien, however matured by age or modeled by experience.

MOVEMENT. (51)

Movement is the rapidity with which the voice moves in reading and speaking. It varies with the nature of the thought or sentiment to be expressed, and should be increased or diminished as good taste may determine. With pupils generally, the tendency is to read too fast. The result is, reading or speaking in too high a key and an unnatural style of delivery--both of which faults are difficult to be corrected when once formed. The kinds of movement are Slow, Moderate, and Quick.

DIRECTIONS.--Read a selection as slowly us possible, without drawling. Read it again and again, increasing the rate of movement at each reading, until it can be read no faster without the utterance becoming indistinct. Reverse this process, reading more and more slowly at each repetition, until the slowest movement is obtained.

SLOW MOVEMENT. (52)

1. Oh that those lips had language! Life has passed
With me but roughly, since I heard them last.

2. A tremulous sigh from the gentle night wind
Through the forest leaves slowly is creeping,
While stars up above, with their glittering eyes,
Keep guard; for the army is sleeping.

3. O Lord'! have mercy upon us, miserable offenders'!

4. So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves
To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

MODERATE MOVEMENT. (52)

1. The good', the brave', the beautiful',
How dreamless' is their sleep,
Where rolls the dirge-like music'
Of the over-tossing deep'!
Or where the surging night winds
Pale Winter's robes have spread
Above the narrow palaces,
In the cities of the dead'!

2. Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.

3. Cast your eyes over this extensive country. Observe the salubrity of your climate, the variety and fertility of your soil; and see that soil intersected in every quarter by bold, navigable streams, flowing to the east and to the west, as if the finger of heaven were marking out the course of your settlements, inviting you to enterprise, and pointing the way to wealth.

QUICK MOVEMENT. (53)

1. Awake'! arise'! or be forever fallen.

2. Merrily swinging on brier and weed,
Near to the nest of his little dame,
Over the mountain side or mead,
Robert of Lincoln is telling his name.

3. Not a word to each other; we kept the great pace--
Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing our place;
I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight,
Then shortened each stirrup and set the pique right,
Rebuckled the check strap, chained slacker the bit,
Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit.

4. Oh my dear uncle, you don't know the effect of a fine spring morning upon a fellow just arrived from Russia. The day looked bright, trees budding, birds singing, the park so gay, that I took a leap out of your balcony, made your deer fly before me like the wind, and chased them all around the park to get an appetite for breakfast, while you were snoring in bed, uncle.

Quality.--We notice a difference between the soft, insinuating tones of persuasion; the full, strong voice of command and decision; the harsh, irregular, and sometimes grating explosion of the sounds of passion; the plaintive notes of sorrow and pity; and the equable and unimpassioned flow of words in argumentative style. This difference consists in a variation in the quality of the voice by which it is adapted to the character of the thought or sentiment read or spoken. In our attempts to imitate nature, however, it is important that all affectation be avoided, for perfect monotony is preferable to this fault. The tones of the voice should be made to correspond with the nature of the subject, without apparent effort.

EXAMPLES. (54)

Passion and Grief

"Come back! come back!" he cried, in grief,
"Across this stormy water;
And I'll forgive your Highland chief,
My daughter! O, my daughter!"

Plaintive

I have lived long enough: my way of life
Is fallen into the sear, the yellow leaf:
And that which should accompany old age,
As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have.

Calm

A very great portion of this globe is covered
with water, which is called sea, and is very
distinct from rivers and lakes.

Fierce Anger

Burned Marmion's swarthy cheek like fire,
And shook his very frame for ire;
And--"This to me!" he said,--
"An 't were not for thy hoary beard,
Such hand as Marmion's had not spared
To cleave the Douglas' head!

Loud and Explosive

"Even in thy pitch of pride,
Here, in thy hold, thy vassals near,
I tell thee, thou 'rt defied!
And if thou said'st I am not peer
To any lord in Scotland here,
Lowland or Highland, far or near,
Lord Angus, thou hast lied!"