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of this? A man may surely so practise his voice before he comes to speak, as to feel justly confident, that he can never fail to express by it the very shade of feeling which he wishes to communicate. It is to the attainment of this excellence, by previous labor, that we urge the student of our system. The accomplished fencer never bestows a thought on his thrusts and parries, at the time when he is engaged in the performance of his most difficult feints. The orator does not call to mind the canons of the rhetorical art, which he has learnt 'years before, and to which his practice is yet all in strict conformity. Is it impossible or unwise to do the very same in respect of Elocution, which all acknowledge should be done in every other department?

The mode by which we propose to accomplish our object is, strictly and exclusively, that of previous practice. A few remarks on the nature and extent of the practice required, will be all we shall offer to conclude this apology for Elocution.

Delivery naturally divides itself into two distinct branches, the correct and elegant utterance of all the sounds or words, to which a meaning has been given by conventional agreement, and the appropriate expression of the feelings of the mind by those means which nature has provided, and which she has rendered equally necessary to all her subjects. For example, if we wish to repeat the sentence, Thou art the man,' in a proper manner, we shall have to direct the attention, first to the articulation of the words, and next to the expression of the meaning.

Any mispronunciation of the words, will be an offence against the conventional authority, which has settled and imposed them. Any erroneous communication of the meaning, will be the result of a departure from the natural canons of delivery. A sentence like the one just given will admit of many meanings, according as the natural elements of expression may be used by the person who reads it. We may make it wholly unemphatic, or, if we please, we may speak it as a positive denunciation. It may even be made a question, Thou art the man?' and the question may have any degree of earnestness we may like to give it. It may be read angrily or sorrowfully. It may have the attention directed to any one of the words in it at pleasure: 'Thou art the man,'Thou art the man,' &c. Any of these changes, (and they are a few only of those which might be enumerated,) are to be effected entirely by the natural modes of expression by the voice and gestures.

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The first step, then, in the gymnastics of Delivery is the acquisition of a perfectly distinct articulation; the second is the obtaining a command over all the other functions of the voice, and over those motions of the body which are useful in supporting their effect. Elocution, in its common sense, does not include the last mentioned item. This is referred to under the head of Gesture. In this work, nothing is said of it. The pupil may be referred, after he has mastered the purely elocutionary system given here and in the Grammar, to another little treatise of

mine expressly on this subject, which will, I am satisfied, prove useful to any who would put this last finish to their mode of delivery.

With respect to the precise character of the illustrations and exercises contained in the succeeding chapters, it may be of use to add one or two hints to those persons who may honor them by employing them in their teaching. If we are not mistaken, there will be found very few, if any, sentences in the body of this little book, which the pupils will not do well to understand and learn. The explanations may not perhaps be in every case of themselves sufficiently copious to meet the intelligence of some children. They have all been written with a view to careful recitation, and the great effort has throughout been to condense them. Wherever it may be found necessary, the teacher should enlarge on them till they are clearly understood. Nothing can be gained without this. The selection of examples, by which to illustrate the various movements of the voice, has proved no easy task. It has been made on the principle of always giving the pupil trial sentences, of such a character that their meaning should be readily perceived, and their proper intonation recognized. A greater number might have been advisable, in order to suit the different capacities of various individuals; but such an attempt would have increased the bulk of the work, beyond its reasonable limits. The teacher's ingenuity must be tasked to invent more, on the pattern furnished him. The degree to

which he will be called to exercise it, will be decided by the talents of his class. No movement of the voice should be passed by, till the pupils have obtained a perfect perception of its sound and uses. In many cases, one example may suffice; in others, several may be needed.

Another point, which must not on any account be lost sight of, is the careful practice of all the prescribed exercises. Practice is the sine qua non of Elocution. If in any department of it, it be omitted, or even slurred over, the inevitable result will be failure. The pupil may have learnt the explanations, and understood them; he may have listened to, and laughed at, the examples; but if he have not practised all the exercises, till he has overcome their difficulties altogether, his own delivery will be but very little improved, however much he may have increased his power of criticizing others.

In this practice of the exercises, many advantages will be found to result from requiring the whole class, however large, to go through all its exercises in concert. Where time allows, it may be well, perhaps, for single scholars in turn to follow the teacher's voice, before the class make the attempt together; but the final concerted movement ought never to be dispensed with. In classes of any size, it is the only way to bring the scholars into any real exercise of the voice under the teacher's correction, for no amount of time will suffice to allow every pupil in his turn to utter separately all the sounds required for the

due training of the voice. In the earlier stages of this training, the pupils will also be found to speak out far more boldly and correctly in concert, than they can be made to do alone. When they have arrived at that stage at which reading forms part of their employment, they will also be obliged by it to keep time, in other words to mind their stops, much better than they otherwise could be. A little practice on the part of the teacher will enable him to correct quite as effectually any error made by individuals, under this system, as under the other.

For the sake of giving variety and interest to this process of elementary drilling, it may be well to relieve it somewhat with reading, almost from the beginning. The pieces given in this book may serve as a first selection. They are of very different characters, selected to exemplify all, or nearly all, the different species of reading. It is not intended that the scholars should merely read them through, in the ordinary fashion of schools. This exercise, like all the others, must be thoroughly practised. Attention should always be especially paid to those points to which the other exercises of the class for the time being refer, whether it be to the rightly sounding all the vocal elements, or to the use of pitch, accent, or any other of the elements of expression. When the class have gone through all, or the greater part, of their regular drilling on these several elements, they ought to be exercised with even greater care in their readings. Every sentence should then be separately

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