Chapter VII: Part ONE: A Discussion of Principles (2)

The speech which is matter-of-fact and commonplace only, has characteristically much short, sharp inflection of voice, with the rapidly varying intervals of pitch that we notice in one's everyday talking. As the utterance takes on force, it is likely to go in a more direct line of average pitch, with stronger inflection on specially emphatic words. As it rises to sentiment, the inflections are less marked, and in the case of a strain of high, nobler feeling, the voice moves on with some approach to the monotone. According as feeling is stronger and firmer, as in the expression of courage, determination, firm resolve, resistance, intense devotion, the voice is kept sustained, with pauses rather abrupt and decisive; if the feeling, though of high sentiment, is tranquil, without aggressiveness, the voice has more of the wavelike rise and fall, and at the pausing places the tone is gradually diminished, rather than abruptly broken off. In the case of quickly impulsive, passionate feeling, the speech is likely to be much varied in pitch, broken by frequent abrupt stops, and decisive inflections. In the case of the expression of tenderness or pathos, there is a lingering tone, with the quality and inflection of plaintiveness, qualified, in public speech, by such dignity and strength as is fitting. In all cases the quality of voice is of course the main thing, and this, not being technical or mechanical, must depend on the speaker's entering into the spirit of the piece and giving color, warmth, and depth to his tones. The spirit of gladness or triumph has usually the higher, brighter, ringing tone; that of gravity, solemnity, awe, the lower, darker, and less varied tone.

In the case of the expression of irony, sarcasm, scorn, contempt, and kindred feelings, the circumflex inflection is the principal feature. This is the curious quirk or double turn in the voice, that is heard when one says, for example, "You're a _fine_ fellow," meaning, "You are anything but a fine fellow." In the earlier part of Webster's reply to Hayne are some of the finest examples of irony, grim or caustic humor, sarcasm, and lofty contempt. They need significant turns and plays of voice, but are often spoiled by being treated as high declamation.

In the expression of the various kinds and degrees of feeling there may be a fully expressed force or a suppressed or restrained force. Often the latter is the more natural and effective. This is intense, but not loud, though at times it may break through its restraint. It is most fitting when the hearers are near at hand, as in the case of a jury or judge in court, when the din of loudness would offend.

The climax is a gradually increasing expression of feeling. It may be by a gradual raising of the voice in pitch; it may be by any sort of increasing effectiveness or moving power. It is rather difficult to manage, and may lead to some strained effort. The speaker should keep a steady, controlled movement, without too much haste, but rather a retarded and broadened utterance as the emphatic point is approached; and always the speaker should keep well within his powers, maintaining always some vocal reserve.

The practice of emotional expression gives warmth, mellowness, sympathy and expansiveness to the voice, and must have considerable cultural value.

SHOWING THE PICTURE

A difficult attainment in speaking is that of vividness. The student may see the picture in his own mind's eye, but his mode of expression does not reveal the fact to others. Imagination in writing he may have, with no suggestion of it in the voice. Too often it is erroneously taken for granted that the human voice, because it is human, will at any call, respond to all promptings of the mind. It will no more do so, of course, than the hand or the eye. It must be trained. Often it is a case not merely of vocal response, but of mental awakening as well, and in that case the student must, if he can, learn to see visions and dream dreams.

A way to begin the suiting of speech to imaginative ideas is to imitate; to make the voice sound like the thing to be suggested. Some things are fast, some slow, some heavy, some light, some dark and dismal, some bright and joyous; some things are noisy, some still; some rattle, others roar; the sea is hoarse; the waves wash; the winds blow; the ocean is level, or it dashes high and breaks; happy things sing, and sad things mourn. All life and nature speak just as we speak. How easy it ought to be for us to speak just as nature speaks. And when our abstract notions are put in concrete expression, or presented as a picture, how easy it would seem, by these simple variations of voice, to speak the language of that picture, telling the length, breadth, action, color, values, spirit of it. That it is a task makes it worth while. It affords infinite variety, and endless delight.

One necessary element in so-called word-painting is that of time. When a speaker expresses himself in pictures for the imagination he must give his hearers time to see these pictures, and to sufficiently see and appreciate the parts, or lines of them, and the significance of them. It is a common fault to hasten over the language of imagination as over the commonplace words. The speaker or reader had better be sure to see the image himself before, and indeed after, he speaks it. Others will then be with him. Although among most young speakers the tone of imagination is lacking, yet often young persons who become proficient vocally are fain greatly to overdo it, till the sound that is suited to the sense becomes sound for its own sake, and thereby obscures the sense. Regard for proportion and fitness, in relation to the central idea or purpose, should control the feeling for color in the detail.

EXPRESSION BY ACTION

It should always be borne in mind that gesture means the bearing or the action of the whole man. It does not mean simply movement of the arm and hand. The practice of gesture should be governed by this understanding of the term. A thought, an emotion, something that moves the man from within, will cause a change, it may be slight, or it may be very marked, in eye, face, body. This is gesture. This change or movement may, from the strength of the feeling that prompts it, extend to the arm and hand. But this latter movement, in arm and hand, is only the fuller manifestation of one's thought or feeling--the completion of the gesture, not the gesture itself. Arm movement, when not preceded or supplemented by body movement, or body pose, is obtrusive action; it brings a member of the body into noticeable prominence, attracting the auditor's eye and taking his mind from the speaker's thought. Better have no gesture than gesture of this kind. The student, then, should first learn to appreciate the force of ideas, to see and feel the full significance of what he would say, and indicate by some general movement of body and expression of face, the changing moods of mind. Then the arm and hand may come--in not too conspicuous a way--to the aid of the body. When Wendell Phillips pointed to the portraits in Faneuil Hall and exclaimed: "I thought those pictured lips would have broken into voice to rebuke the recreant American,--the slanderer of the dead," it was not, we may be sure, the uplifted arm alone, but the pose of the man, the something about his whole being, which bespoke the spirit within him, and which was really the gesture. In less positive or striking degrees of action, the body movement will, of course, be very slight, at times almost imperceptible, but the principle always holds, and should be from the first taught. In gesture, the bodily man acts as a unit.

The amount of gesture is, of course, determined by the temperament of the speaker, the nature of the speech, the character of the audience, and the occasion of the address. One speaker will, under certain conditions, gesticulate nearly all the time; another will, under the same conditions, seem seldom to move in any way. The two may be equally effective. A speech that is charged with lively emotion will usually be accompanied by action; a speech expressive of the profound feeling that subdues to gravity, or resignation, would be comparatively without action. The funeral oration by Mark Antony is full of action because it is really intended to excite the will of his audience; in a funeral address simply expressive of sorrow and appreciation, gesture would, as a rule, be out of place. A sharply contested debate may need action that punctuates and enforces; the pleasantry of after-dinner talk may need only the voice. So, one audience, not quick in grasping ideas, may need, both in language and action, much clear, sharp indication of the point by illustration, much stirring up by physical attack, so to speak, while another audience would be displeased by this unnecessary effort to be clear and expressive. Yet again, given a certain speaker and a certain subject and a certain audience, it is obvious that the occasion will determine largely how the speaker will bear himself. The atmosphere of a college commencement will be different from that of a barbecue, and the speaker would, within the limits set by his own personality and his own dignity, adapt himself to the one or the other. The general law of appropriateness and good taste must determine the amount of gesture.

For the purposes of this work there is probably very little, if any, value in a strict classification of gestures. It may, at times, be convenient to speak of one gesture as merely for emphasis, of another as indicating location, of another as giving illustration, of one as more subjective, expressing a thought that reflects back upon the speaker, or is said more in the way of self-communion, of another as objective, concerned only with outer objects or with ideas more apart from the person or the inward feeling of the speaker. But it can easily be shown that one idea, or one dominant feeling, may be expressed by many kinds of action, in fact, so far at least as prescribed movements are concerned, in directly opposite kinds, and gesture is so largely a matter of the individual, and is governed so much by mixed motive and varying circumstance, that the general public speaker will profit little by searching for its philosophic basis, and trying to practice according to any elaborated system. The observing of life, with the exercise of instinct, taste, sense, above all of honest purpose--these, with of course the help of competent criticism, will serve as sufficient practical guides in the cultivation of expressive action.

Some observations, or perhaps general principles, may be offered as helpful. When a speaker is concerned with driving ideas straight home to his audience, as in putting bare fact in a debate, his action will be more direct; it will move in straighter lines and be turned, like his thought, more directly upon his audience. As his statement is more exactly to a point, so his gesture becomes more pointed and definite. When the speaker is not talking to or at his audience, to move them to his will, but is rather voicing the ideas and feelings already possessed by them, and is in a non-aggressive mood, he is likely to use less of the direct and emphasis-giving gesture, and to employ principally the gesture that is merely illustrative of his ideas, more reposeful, less direct, less tense.

To consider more in detail the principle that the man, and not the arm, is the gesture, a man should look what he is to speak. The eye should always have a relation to gesture. The look may be in the direction of the arm movement or in another direction. No practical rule can be given. It can only be said that the eye must play its part. Observing actions in real life, we see that when one person points out an object to another, he looks now at the object, now at the person, as if to guide that person's look. When he hears a sound he may glance in the direction of it, but then look away to listen. Often a suspended action, with a fixed look of the face, will serve to arrest the attention of auditors and fix it upon an idea. One should cultivate first the look, then the supporting or completing action.

As to the movement of the arm and the form of the hand, one should be careful not to become stiff and precise by following exact rules. In general, it may be said that the beginning of the arm movement, being from the body, is in the upper arm; the finish of it is at the tips of the fingers, with the forefinger leading, or bringing the gesture to a point. There is generally a slightly flexible, rythmical movement of the arm and hand. This should not, as a rule, be very marked, and in specially energetic action is hardly observable. In this arm action there is an early preparatory movement, which indicates or suggests, what is coming. Often a moment of suspense in the preparation enhances the effect of the finish, or stroke, of the gesture, which corresponds usually to the vocal emphasis. At the final pointing of the action, the hand is, for a moment or for moments, fixed, as the mind and the man are fixed, for the purpose of holding the attention of the auditor; then follows the recovery, so-called, from the gesture, or it may be, the passing to another gesture. And all the while, let it again be said, slight changes of bodily pose with proper adjustments of the feet, will make the harmonious, unified action. It should be remembered that, as in viewing a house or a picture we should be impressed by the main body and the general effect, rather than by any one feature, so on the same principle, no striking feature of a man's action should attract attention to itself. On the same principle, no part of the hand should be made conspicuous--the thumb or forefinger should not be too much stuck out, nor the other fingers, except in pointing, be very much curved in. Generally, except in precise pointing, there is a graduated curving, not too nice, from the bent little finger to the straighter forefinger. As the gesture is concerned with thought more delicate, the action of the hand is lighter and tends more to the tips of the fingers; as it is more rugged and strong, the hand is held heavier. It is bad to carry the arm very far back, causing a strained look; to stretch the arms too straight out, or to confine the elbow to the side. The elbow is kept somewhat away even in the smallest gesture. While action should have nerve, it should not become nervous, that is, over- tense and rigid. It should be free and controlled, with good poise in the whole man.

Before leaving this subject, in its physical aspect, let us consider somewhat the matter of standing and moving on the platform. Among imperfections as regards position, that kind of imperfection which takes the form of perfectly fixed feet, strictly upright figure, hands at the side, head erect, and eyes straight-of all bad kinds, this kind is the worst. This is often referred to as school declamation, or the speaking of a piece. We have discarded many old ideas of restriction in education. Let us discard the strait-jacket in platform speaking. Nobody else ever speaks as students are often compelled to speak. Let them speak like boys--not like men even--much less like machines. There is of course a good and a bad way of standing and moving, but much is due to youth, to individuality, and to earnest intention, and a student should have free play in a large degree.

In walking, the step should neither be too fast nor too slow, too long nor too short, too much on the heel or too much on the toe. A simple, straightforward way of getting there is all that is wanted. The arms are left to swing easily, but not too much; nor should one arm swing more than the other. The head, it will be noted, may occasionally rise and fall as one goes up or down steps or walks the platform. Before beginning to speak, one should not obviously take a position and prepare. He should easily stop at his place, and, looking at his auditors, begin simply to say something to them. As to the feet, they will, of course, be variously placed or adjusted according to the pose of the body in the varying moods of the speech. In general, the body will rest more on one foot than on the other. In a position of ease, as usually at the beginning of a speech, one foot will bear most of the weight. In this case, this foot will normally be pointed nearly to the front; the other foot will be only very slightly in advance of this and will be turned more outward. The feet will not be close together; nor noticeably far apart. They need not--they had better not--as it is sometimes pictured in books, be so set that a line passing lengthwise through the freer foot will pass through the heel of the other foot. As a man becomes earnest in speaking, his posture will vary, and often he will stand almost equally on his two feet. In changing one's position, it is best to acquire the habit of moving the freer foot, the one lighter on the floor, first, thus avoiding a swaying, or toppling look of the body.

In connection with the subject of standing, naturally comes the question of the arms in the condition of inaction. It is possibly well to train one's self, when learning to speak, to let the arms hang relaxed at the side, but speakers do not often so hold the arms. Usually there is a desk near, and the speaker when at rest drops one hand upon this, or he lets one arm rest at the waist, or he brings the two hands together. Any of these things may be done, if done simply, easily, without nervous tightening, or too frequent shifting. One thing, for practical reasons, should not be allowed, the too common habit of clasping the hands behind the back. It will become a fixed mannerism, and a bad one, for the hands are thus concealed, the shoulders and head may droop forward, and the hands may be so tightened together behind the back as to cause nervous tension in the body and in the voice. The hands should be in place ready for expressive action. The back is not such a place.

Nearly every movement that a man makes in speaking should have some fitting relation to what he is at the moment saying. These movements will then be varied. When certain repeated actions, without this proper relation, are acquired, they are called mannerisms. They have no meaning, and are obtrusive and annoying. Repeated jerking or bobbing of the head, for a supposed emphasis; regularly turning the head from side to side, for addressing all the audience; nervous shaking of the head, as of one greatly in earnest; repeated, meaningless punching or pounding of the air, always in the same way; shifting of one foot regularly backward and forward; rising on the toes with each emphatic word,--although single movements similar to these often have appropriate place, none of these or others should be allowed to become fixed mannerisms, habitually recurring movements, without a purpose. We are sometimes told that certain manneristic ways are often a speaker's strength. Probably this is at least half true. But eccentricities should not be cultivated or indulged. They will come. We should have as few as possible, or they won't count. One thing, however, should here be said. Positive strength, with positive faults, is much better than spiritless inoffensiveness. One should not give all his attention to the avoiding of faults.

In the application of gesture to the expression of ideas, one is helped, as has been said, by constantly heeding the general principle of suiting the form of the gesture to the nature of the thought, or of suiting the action to the word. Inasmuch as gesture so generally takes the form of objects or actions, it is undoubtedly easier to begin with the more concrete in language, or with the discussion of tangible objects, and work from these to the more abstract and remotely imaginary--from the more, to the less, familiar. Let the student indicate the location, or the height, or the width, or the form of an object. His action will probably be appropriate. Let him apply similar, probably less definite, action to certain abstract ideas. Let him pass to ideas more remote and vague, by action largely suggestive, not definite or literal.

The most important, because the most fundamental, principle to be borne in mind is that gesture should be made to enforce, not the superficial, or incidental, ideas appearing in a statement, but the ideas which lie behind the form of expression and are the real basis, or inhere in the fundamental purpose, of the speaker's discourse.

At the close of Senator Thurston's speech on intervention in behalf of Cuba, there is picturesque language for impressing the contention that force is justified in a worthy cause. The speaker cites graphically examples of force at Bunker Hill, Valley Forge, Shiloh, Chattanooga, and Lookout Heights. The student is here very likely to be led astray by the fine opportunity to make gesture. He may vividly see and picture the snows of Valley Forge, marked with bloodstained feet, and the other scenes suggested, but forget about the central idea, the purpose behind all the vivid forms of expression. Graphic, detailed gestures may have the effect of making the pictures in themselves the main object. The action here should be informal, unstudied, and merely remotely suggestive. The speaker should keep to his one central idea, and keep with his audience. Otherwise the speech will be insincere and purposeless, perhaps absurd. The fundamental, not the superficial, should determine the action. Young speakers almost invariably pick out words or phrases, suggesting the possibility of a gesture, and give exact illustration to them, as if the excellence of gesture were in itself an object, when really the thing primarily to be enforced is not these incidental features in the form of expression, but the underlying idea of the whole passage. It is as if the steeple were made out of proportion to the church, or a hat out of proportion to the man. This misconception of what gesture really means is doubtless, in large measure, the cause of making platform recitation often false and offensive. The remedy does not lie in omitting gesture altogether, as some seem to think, but in making gesture simple and true.

Finally, let the student remember that he goes to the platform, not to make a splendid speech and receive praise for a brilliant exhibition of his art, but that he goes there because the platform is a convenient place from which to tell the people something he has to say. Let him think it nothing remarkable that he should be there; let him so bear himself, entering with simplicity, honesty, earnestness, and modesty, into his work, that no one will think much about how his work is done. Spirited oratory, with the commanding presence, the sweeping action, and an overmastering force of utterance, may at times be called forth, but these are given to a man out of his subject and by the occasion; they are not to be assumed by him merely because he is before an audience, or as necessary features of speech-making. Let the student speak, first and always, as a self-respecting, thinking man, earnest and strong, but self-controlled and sensible.

PLATFORM PRACTICE

THE FORMAL ADDRESS

The selections in the several sections for platform practice are to be used for applying, in appropriate combination, the principles heretofore worked out, one by one. The first group provides practice in the more formal style. The occasion of the formal address requires, in large degree, restraint and dignity. The thought is elevated; the mood serious, in some cases subdued, the form of expression exact and firm. The delivery should correspond. The tone should be, in some degree, ennobled; the movement deliberate, and comparatively even and measured; the modulation not marked by striking variations in pitch; the pauses rather regular, and the gesture always sparing, perhaps wholly omitted. The voice should be generally pure and fine; the enunciation should be finished and true. Whatever action there may be should be restrained, well poised, deliberate, with some degree of grace. In general it should be felt that carelessness or looseness or aggressiveness or undue demonstrativeness would be out of harmony with the spirit of the occasion. Good taste must be exercised at every step, and the audience should be addressed, from the outset, as in sympathy with the speaker and ready at once to approve. The spirit and manner of contention is out of place.

In this style of discourse the liability to failure lies in the direction of dullness, monotony, lack of vitality and warmth. This is because the feeling is deep and still; is an undercurrent, strong but unseen. This restrained, repressed feeling is the most difficult fittingly to express. In this kind of speech some marring of just the right effect is difficult to avoid. Simplicity, absolute genuineness, are the essential qualities. The ideas must be conveyed with power and significance, in due degree; but nothing too much is particularly the watchword regarding the outward features of the work.

THE PUBLIC LECTURE

In the public lecture the element of entertainment enters prominently. The audience, at first in a passive state, must be awakened, and taken on with the speaker. Probably it must be instructed, perhaps amused. The speaker must make his own occasion. He has no help from the circumstance of predisposition among his auditors. He must compel, or he must win; he must charm or thrill; or he must do each in turn. Animation, force, beauty, dramatic contrast, vividness, variety, are the qualities that will more or less serve, according to the style of the composition. Aptness in the story or anecdote, facility in graphic illustration, readiness in expressing emotion, happiness in the imitative faculty, for touching off the eccentric in character or incident, are talents that come into play, and in the exercise of these, gesture of course has an important place.

The lecture platform is perhaps the only field, with possibly the exception of what is properly the after-dinner speech, wherein public speaking may be viewed as strictly an art, something to be taken for its own sake, wherein excellence in the doing is principally the end in view. This means, generally, that individual talent, and training in all artistic requirements, count for more than the subject or any "accidents of office," in holding the auditor's interest. An animated and versatile style can be cultivated by striving to make effective the public lecture.

THE INFORMAL DISCUSSION

Informal discussion is the name chosen for the lecture or talk in the club or the classroom. It implies a rather small audience and familiar relations between audience and speaker. While the subject may be weighty, and the language may be necessarily of the literary or scientific sort, the style of speaking should be colloquial. It ought to bring the hearer pretty near to the speaker. If the subject and language are light, the speaking will be sprightly and comparatively swift.

Since the occasion for this kind of speaking is frequent, and the opportunity for it is likely to fall to almost any educated man, proficiency in it might well be made an object in the course of one's educational training. The end aimed at is the ability to talk well. This accomplishment is not so easy as it may seem. It marks, indeed, the stage of maturity in speech-making. Since authoritative opinion from the speaker and interest in the subject on the part of the audience are prime elements in this form of discussion, little cultivation of form is usually given to this kind of speaking. The result is much complaining from auditors about inaudibleness, dullness, monotony, annoying mannerisms, or a too formal, academic tone that keeps the audience remote, a lack of what is called the human quality. A good talker from the desk not only has the reward of appreciation and gratitude, but is able to accomplish results in full proportion to all that he puts into the improvement of his vocal work. An agreeable tone, easy formation of words, clear, well-balanced emphasis, good phrasing, or grouping of words in the sentence, some vigor without continual pounding, easy, unstudied bodily movement without manneristic repetition of certain motions, in short, good form without any obtrusive appearance of form,--these are the qualities desired.

ARGUMENTATIVE SPEECH

In the case of the forensic, we come nearer to the practical in public speaking. The speaker aims, as a rule, to effect a definite purpose, and he concentrates his powers upon this immediate object. Since the speech is for the most part an appeal to the reason, and therefore deals largely with fact and the logical relations of ideas, precision and clearness of statement are the chief qualities to be cultivated. But since the aim is to overcome opposition, and produce conviction, and so to impress and stir as to affect the will to a desired action, the element of force, and the moving quality of persuasion enters in as a reėnforcement of the speaker's logic. Generally the speech is very direct, and often it is intense. It has in greater degree than any other form the feature of aggressiveness. Some form of attack is adopted, for the purpose of overthrowing the opposing force. That attack is followed up in a direct line of argument, and is carried out to a finish. In delivery the continuous line of pursuit thus followed often naturally leads to a kind of effective monotone style, wherein the speaker keeps an even force, or strikes blow after blow, or sends shot after shot. The characteristic feature of the forensic style is the climax--climax in brief successions of words, climax in the sentence, climax in giving sections of the speech, climax in the speech as a whole.

Special notice should be taken of the fact that, in earnest argument, sentences have, characteristically, a different run from that in ordinary expository speaking. Whereas in the expository style the sentence flows, as a rule, easily forth, with the voice rising and falling, in an undulatory sort of way, and dropping restfully to a finish, in the heated forensic style, the sentence is given the effect of being sent straight forth, as if to a mark, with the last word made the telling one, and so kept well up in force and pitch. The accumulating force has the effect of sending the last word home, or of making it the one to clinch the statement.

The dangers to be guarded against in debate are wearying monotony, over-hammering--too frequent, too hard, too uniform an emphasis--too much, or too continued heat, too much speed, especially in speaking against time, a loss of poise in the bearing, a halting or jumbling in speech, nervous tenseness in action, an overcontentious or bumptious spirit. Bodily control, restraint, good temper, balance, are the saving qualities. A debater must remember that he need not be always in a heat. Urbanity and graciousness have their place, and the relief afforded by humor is often welcome and effective.

In no form of speaking, except that of dramatic recitation, is the liability to impairment of voice so great as it is in debating. One of the several excellent features of debating is that of the self- forgetfulness that comes with an earnest struggle to win. But perhaps a man cannot safely forget himself until he has learned to know himself. The intensity of debating often leads, in the case of a speaker vocally untrained, to a tightening of the throat in striving for force, to a stiffening of the tongue and lips for making incisive articulation, to a rigidness of the jaw from shutting down on words to give decisive emphasis. Soon the voice has the juice squeezed out of it. The tone becomes harsh and choked; then ragged and weak. The only remedy is to go straight back and begin all over, just as a golfer usually does when he has gone on without instruction. The necessity of going back is often not realized till later in life; then the process is much harder, and perhaps can never be entirely effective. The teacher in the course of his experience meets many, many such cases. The time to learn the right way is at the beginning.

Among the selections here offered for forensic practice, examples in debate serve for the cultivation of the aggressiveness that comes from immediate opposition; examples in the political speech for acquiring the abandon and enthusiasm of the so-called popular style; in the legal plea for practice in suppressed force. In the case of the last of these, it is well that the audience be near to the speaker, as is the case in an address to a judge or jury. The idea is to be forcible without being loud and high; to cultivate a subdued tone that shall, at the same time, be vital and impressive. The importance of a manner of speaking that is not only clear and effective, but also agreeable, easy to listen to, is quite obvious when we consider the task of a judge or a jury, who have to sit for hours and try to carry in their minds the substance of all that has been said, weighing point against point, balancing one body of facts against another. A student can arrange nearly the same conditions as to space, and can, by exercise of imagination, enter into the spirit of a legal conflict.

THE AFTER-DINNER SPEECH

After-dinner speaking is another form that many men may have an opportunity to engage in. It can also be practiced under conditions resembling those of the actual occasion, that is, members of the class can be so seated that the speaking may become intimate in tone, and speeches can be selected that will serve for cultivating that distinctive, sociable quality of voice that, in itself, goes far in contributing to the comfort and delight of the after-dinner audience. The real after-dinner speech deals much in pleasantry. The tone of voice is characteristically unctuous. Old Fezziwig is described by Dickens as calling out "in a comfortable, rich, fat, jovial, oily voice." Something like this is perhaps the ideal after-dinner voice, although there is a dry humor as well as an unctuous, and each speaker will, after all, have his own way of making his hearers comfortable, happy, and attentive. Ease and deliberation are first requisites. Nervous intensity may not so much mar the effect of earnest debate. The social chat is spoiled by it. Humor, as a rule, requires absolute restfulness. Especially should a beginner guard himself against haste in making the point at the finish of a story. It does no harm to keep the hearer waiting a bit, in expectation. The effect may be thus enhanced, while the effect will be entirely lost if the point, and the true touch, are spoiled by uncontrolled haste. The way to gain this ease and control is not by stiffening up to master one's self, but by relaxing, letting go of one's self. Practice in the speech of pleasantry may have great value in giving a man repose, in giving him that saving grace, an appreciation of the humorous, in affording him a means of relief or enlivenment to the serious speech.

THE OCCASIONAL POEM

The occasional poem is so frequently brought forth in connection with speech-making that some points regarding metrical reading may be quite in place in a speaker's training. Practice in verse reading is of use also because of the frequency of quoted lines from the poets in connection with the prose speech.

To read a poem well one must become in spirit a poet. He must not only think, he must feel. He must exercise imagination. He must, we will say it again, see visions and dream dreams. What was said about vividness in the discussion of expressional effects applies generally to the reading of poetry. One will read much better if he has tried to write-- in verse as well as in prose. He will then know how to put himself in the place of the poet, and will not be so likely to mar the poet's verses by "reading them ill-favoredly." He will know the value of words that have been so far sought, and may not slur over them; he may feel the sound of a line formed to suggest a sound in nature. He will know that a meter has been carefully worked out, and that, in the reading, that meter is of the spirit of the poem; it is not to be disregarded. Likewise he will appreciate the place of rhyme, and may not try so to cover it up as entirely to lose its effect. In humorous verse, especially, rhyme plays an effective part; and in all verse, alliteration, variations in melody, the lighter and the heavier touch, acceleration and retard in movement, the caesura, or pause in the line, and the happy effect of the occasional cadence, are features which one can come to appreciate and respect only with reading one's favorite poems many times, with spirit warm, with faculties alert.

THE MAKING OF THE SPEECH

Although the use of selected speeches is best for effective drill in delivery, yet a student's training for public speaking is of course not complete until he has had experience in applying his acquired skill to the presenting of his own thought. Thinking and speaking should be made one operation. The principles of composition for the public speech belong to a separate work. A few hints only can be given here, and these will be concerned with the informal, offhand speech rather than with the formal address.

The usual directions regarding the choosing of the subject, the collecting of material, and the arranging of it in the most effective order, with exceptions and variations, hold in all forms of the speech. The subject chosen should be one of special interest to the speaker, one on which it is known he can speak with some degree of authority, because of his personal study of it, or because of his having had exceptional personal relations with it. It must also be, because of the nature of it, or because of some special treatment, of particular interest to the audience to be addressed. Either new, out-of-the-way subjects, or new, fresh phases of old subjects are usually interesting. The subject must be limited in its comprehensiveness to suit the time allowed for speaking, and the title of the speech should be so phrased as to indicate exactly what the subject, or the part of a subject, is to be. To this carefully limited and defined subject, the speaker should rigidly adhere.

How to find a subject is generally a topic on which students are advised. Though it is often a necessity to hunt for a suitable special topic on which to speak, the student should know that when he gets outside the classroom, he will find that he will not be invited to speak because he is ready at finding subjects and clever in speech. It is not strange, in view of the many advertisements that reach young men, offering methods of home training, or promising sure success from this or that special method of schooling, that they may come to believe that any one has only to learn to stand up boldly on a platform, and with voice and gesture exercise some mysterious sort of magical control over an audience, and his success as an orator is secure. They will find that their time and money have been wasted, so far as public speaking is concerned, unless, having at the start some native ability, they have secured, in addition, a kind of training that is fundamental. A man is wanted as a speaker primarily because he stands for something; because he has done some noteworthy work. His subjects for discussion arise out of his personal interests, and, to a large extent, his method of treatment will be determined by his relation to these subjects. A young man may well be advised, then, not simply how to choose and how to present a subject, but first to secure a good mental training, and then to find for himself an all-absorbing work to do. The wisdom that comes from a concentrated intellectual activity, and an interest in men's affairs, both directed to some unselfish end, is the essential qualification of the speaker.

In considering the arrangement of a speech, the student will do well to ask himself first, not what is to be the beginning of it, but what is to be the end of it; what is the purpose of it; and what shall be the central idea; what impression, or what principal thought or thoughts, shall be left with the audience. When this is determined, then a way of working out this central idea or of working up to it--in a short speech, by a few points only--must be carefully and thoroughly planned. Extemporaneous speaking is putting spontaneously into words what has previously been well thought out and well arranged. Without this state of preparation, the way of wisdom is silence.

The language of a speech is largely determined by the man's habit of mind, the nature of his subject, and the character of his audience. Students often err in one of two directions, either by being too bookish in language or by allowing the other extreme of looseness, weak colloquialism in words, and formless monotony of sentence, with the endless repetition of the connective "and." Language should be fresh, vital, varied. It should have some dignity. Much reading, writing, and speaking are necessary to secure an adequate vocabulary, and a readiness in putting in firm form a variety of sentences. Concreteness of expression and occasional illustration are more needed in speech than in writing, and the brief anecdote or story is welcome and useful if there is room for it, and if it comes unbidden, by virtue of its fitness and spontaneity, and is not drawn in by the ears for half- hearted service. The inevitable story at the opening of an after-dinner speech might often be spared. Although a good story is in itself enjoyable, yet when a speaker feels that he must make one fit into the speech, whether or no, by applying it to himself or his subject or the occasion, the effect is often very unhappy. A man is best guided in these things simply by being true, by being sincere rather than artful. On this same principle, a student may need some advice with regard to his spirit and manner in giving expression to his own ideas before an audience. He need not, as students often seem to think they must, appear to have full knowledge or final judgment on the largest of subjects. It is more fitting that he should speak as a student, an inquirer, not as an authority. If his statements are guarded and qualified; if he speaks as one only inclined to an opinion when finality of judgment is obviously beyond his reach; if he directly refers, and defers, to opinions that must be better than his can be, his speech will have much more weight, and he will grow in strength of character by always being true to himself. It is a question whether students are not too often inspired to be bold and absolute, for the sake of apparent strength in speaking, rather than modest and judicious and sensible, for the sake of being strong as men.

In the form of delivering one's thought to an audience, it is of the first importance that one should speak and not declaim. There is, of course, a way of talking on the platform that is merely negatively good, a way that is fitting enough in general style, but weak. There should be breadth, and strength, and reach. But this does not mean any necessity of sending forth pointless successive sentences over the heads of an audience. A college president recently said, "Our boys declaim a good deal, though they're not so bad as they used to be. It seems to me," he added, "that the idea is to say something to your audience." That is what a teacher must be continually insisting on, that the student say something to somebody, not chant or declaim into space. And the student should be continually testing himself on this point, whether he is looking into the faces of his hearers and speaking, though on a larger scale, yet in the usual way of communicating ideas.

It is not desirable that men should become overready speakers. Methods of training in extemporaneous discussion that require speaking without thought, on anything or nothing that can be at the moment invented, are likely to be mischievous. Thought suggests expression, and exact thought will find fit form. Sound thinking is the main thing. Practice for mere fluency tends to the habit of superficial thinking, and produces the wearisome, endless talker. In this connection emphasis may be laid upon the point of ending a speech when its purpose is accomplished, and that as soon as can be. Many speeches are spoiled by the last third or quarter of them, when a point well made has lost its effect by being overenforced or obscured by a wordy conclusion. Let the student study for rare thought and economy of speech.

Books on speaking have repeatedly insisted that after all has been said, the public speaker's word will be taken for what he is known to be worth as a man; that his utterances will have effect according as they are given out with soul-felt earnestness. This has already been touched upon here, and it is well that it should be often repeated. It may be well, however, also to consider quite carefully what part is played in men's efforts by the element of skill. Of two equally worthy and equally earnest men, the man of the superior skill, acquired by persistent training in method, will be the stronger man, the man who will be of more service to his fellows. More than this, inasmuch as public men can seldom be perfectly known or judged as to character, and may often, for a time at least, deceive, it is quite possible that the unscrupulous man with great skill will, at some moment of crisis, make the worse appear to be the better cause. Equally skilled men are therefore wanted to contend for the side of right. The man whose service to men depends largely upon his power of speech--in the pulpit, at the bar, or in non-professional capacity--must have, either from gift or from training, the speaker's full equipment, for matching himself against opposing strength.

REVIEW EXERCISES

For convenience of practice, a few pages of brief exercises, exemplifying the foregoing principles, are given at the end of the book. By using each day one example in each group, and changing from time to time, the student will have sufficient variety to serve indefinitely. This vocal practice may be made a healthful and pleasurable daily exercise.