the shorter one home, if they get a bite at a time and gradually initiate our national government into the pieces of a complete department of education, until there are so many pieces and so much confusion, if you please, from so many pieces, that the government will be under the compulsion of erecting a single department, to correlate and unite them all.

(c) Today the very perfunctory procedure allowed by the law does not permit consuls to pass upon the qualifications for admission, which the Immigration Service alone is authorized to perform; but what it is doing is getting the immigrant nearer his starting-point; and perhaps it will wake us up to the fact that the immigrant would be very much friendlier to America if the numerous regrettable instances did not occur of immigrants coming here and finding that they had torn themselves up by the roots, taken the long journey to this far country, only to be rejected as undesirable, an action which it is the duty of our country to take, from the fundamental, primitive law of self-preservation and self-protection. (d) The commander of one of the divisions of our army seemed to appreciate this principle very exactly and thoroughly, when he was faced with the problem of two thousand Austrians getting ready to leave his cantonment, when, along in December of 1917, we declared war against the dual empire, for the draft law had gathered in such subjects of Austro-Hungary as had taken out first papers here.

(e) You have the thing so high that the public strikes in buying, and when the public will not buy, your market is gone, production will either decrease or close down, and then business stops, then capital is not invested, and then labor is out of employment, and then everything is dislocated; and what I am trying to do is to see how we can strike a scale of cost production within the possibility of the public to purchase.

(f) Then we reduced the hours of work, and while in a degree that is always advisable, yet when you go below a certain time, where you are increasing the cost and decreasing production, that is dangerous. (g) Of course that is unsound, unscientific and uneconomical, and therefore it strikes me that while we have done something in the way of lowering the surtax, it should not have been placed as high as 50 per cent, and we will have to reduce that before very long. 12. Find a selection that is dull and obscure because of its wordiness. Re-write and read both passages to the class.

13. Examine the rhetorical devices in this familiar passage from Robert Ingersoll. Point out examples of alliteration, personification, repetition, balance, simile, metonymy, metaphor, euphony, and climax. What devices are most prominent? Why do you enjoy the selection? Why is it not quite convincing?

Read the passage aloud frequently. It furnishes excellent practice for poise, deliberation, pause, voice placement, and expansive and authoritative tone and action.

A little while ago, I stood by the grave of the old Napoleon-a magnificent tomb of gilt and gold, almost fit for a dead deity-and gazed upon the sarcophagus of black Egyptian marble, where rest the ashes of that restless man. I leaned over the balustrade and thought about the career of the greatest soldier of the modern world.

I saw him walking upon the banks of the Seine contemplating suicide. I saw him at Toulon; I saw him putting down the mob in the streets of Paris; I saw him at the head of the army in Italy; I saw him conquer the Alps and mingle the eagles of France with the eagles of the crags; I saw him at Marengo, at Ulm, and Austerlitz; I saw him in Russia where the infantry of the snow and the cavalry of the wild blast scattered his legions like winter's withered leaves; I saw him at Leipsic in defeat and disasterdriven by a million bayonets back upon Paris-clutched like a wild beastbanished to Elba. I saw him escape and retake an empire by the force of his genius. I saw him upon the frightful field of Waterloo, where Chance and Fortune combined to wreck the fortunes of their former king, and I saw him at St. Helena, with his hands crossed behind him, gazing out upon the sad and solemn sea.

I thought of the orphans and widows he had made, of the tears that had been shed for his glory, and of the only woman he ever loved, pushed from his heart by the cold hand of ambition; and I said I would rather have been a French peasant and worn wooden shoes; I would rather have lived in a hut with a vine growing over the door and the grapes growing purple in the rays of the autumn sun; I would rather have been that poor peasant with my loving wife by my side, knitting as the day died out of the sky, with my children about my knee and their arms about me; I would rather have been that man and gone down to the tongueless silence of the dreamless dust than have been that imperial personification of force and murder. 14. Scott Fitzgerald in his play, "The Vegetable," has a little fun at the expense of a certain type of public speaker. He says he found the following speech, given by one of the characters, verbatim in The Congressional Record. Make a list of the mixed figures and explain the illogical combinations. Cite other mistakes and absurdities in the passage:

Gentlemen, before you take this step into your hands I want to put my best foot forward. Let us consider a few aspects. For instance, for the first aspect let us take, for example, the War of the Revolution. There was ancient Rome, for example. Let us not only live so that our children who live after us, but also that our ancestors who preceded us and fought to make this country what it is! . . . And now, gentlemen, a boy today is a man tomorrow-or, rather, in a few years. Consider the winning of the WestDaniel Boone and Kit Carson, and in our own time Buffalo Bill and— and Jesse James! . . . Finally, in closing I want to tell you about a vision of mine that I seem to see. I seem to see Columbia-Columbia-ah-blindfolded-ah-covered with scales-driving the ship of State over the battlefields of the republic into the heart of the Golden West and the cotton fields of the Sunny South.

CHAPTER IX

IMPROVING THE VOICE

The quality of a salesman's voice frequently sells more goods than his arguments. There is no conviction in dull, listless tones or nasal, squeaky, growling or throaty utterance. "The voice is the man," says Paul Heyse, and it is the man we judge before we are interested in his goods. Voice without words is eloquent. Sometimes you hear strange voices in the next room or some distance away. You cannot see the faces or distinguish the voices. But you may still get specific or vivid impressions of the speakers. You are sure they are cheerful or depressed, triumphant or angry, weak or strong, irritable or good-natured, querulous or calm, affected or sincere. Some of them you instinctively like, others you dislike. You unconsciously judge the character of a man, in large measure, by his voice.

The American Voice.-In Europe tone and enunciation are class distinctions. Europeans never tire of telling what poor voices Americans have. They object to the nasal, nervous, highpitched tones of our women and the colorless or crude, uncultured voices of the men. They think we sound like well-fed savages and not like cultivated citizens of a great country. This criticism may be prompted in part by a rather common supercilious and patronizing attitude, but it has enough truth in it to teach us a valuable lesson. There is probably, on the whole, more poor voice in Europe than there is here. Poverty, ignorance, and misery produce it, but the upper classes, through inheritance, environment and deliberate thought about the significance of good voice quality, are distinguished by more attractive and musical modulations.

Pride in Speech.-The fact is, we are just becoming conscious of the influence of voice. We are just emerging from a pioneer stage in which as a nation we had little pride in speech. We have

heard our noble English language corrupted and degraded by hundreds of dialects and the "pigeon" English of millions of immigrants as well as by our own indifference. Popular education is doing little so far in attacking this problem, but the great interest shown everywhere in the study of oral English is a most encouraging sign of a wide-spread desire for a genuine culture. Perhaps the most important test of education is the ability to speak one's language well, and in the future college degrees will have comparatively little social value to those who fail to meet this requirement.

Organic Differences. We usually overlook the fact that we can train and improve the speaking voice just as we do the singing voice. Indeed they are the same thing, and the same principles of development are applied to both. To be sure, no two voices are alike. We are born with certain conditions that cannot be changed. In this respect we are like so many violins or flutes or cornets. These differ in fundamental timbre, klangfarbe or tone-color according to their size and the shape and texture of their materials. The Stradivarius has an initial superiority over other violins. Caruso is said to have had longer vocal cords, larger lungs, deeper chest, larger teeth, roomier resonance chambers in the head and mouth than the vast majority of human beings. Here are the differences we cannot overcome, but this is only half the story. Caruso would not have been a great singer if he had not assiduously cultivated his voice. Between his early singing and that of his prime there was almost as much difference as that between the wild rose and the garden rose. The Stradivarius in the hands of a poor player will not give us the pleasure of a mediocre instrument in the hands of a master.

Then, too, the difference in the fundamental tone may not be one that implies better or worse. We hear many fine speakers and singers. Each has a different appeal and voice quality, but we may enjoy one as much as another. This distinctiveness gives us an individuality that we ought to prize. It is the thing that identifies us more than our clothes or our personal appearance. We readily distinguish the voices of our acquaintances over the telephone or in the next room. Our voices reflect us, and with this thought goes the comforting fact that practically every voice can be made agreeable and persuasive.

Good Health.-The most obvious requirement of good voice is good health. The voice is sensitive and expressive of the condition of the body. When a man is sick his voice is thinner and weaker: when he is well it is correspondingly more robust and colorful. Farmers, sailors and all out-door workers have generally a mellower, richer fundamental tone. Constrictions or disease of the lungs, throat, mouth or nose prevent the making of satisfactory tone. Many persons handicap themselves all their lives by neglecting serious defects which could be removed by a simple bit of surgery.

Breathing. Breath is the raw material of tone. You inhale and fill the porous sponge-like lungs, which then press down upon the diaphragm, the rather tough, elastic muscle that is the floor of the chest and the roof of the abdomen. The diaphragm arches up somewhat like a dome, and in deep breathing the lungs flatten and harden it. When you exhale, the diaphragm rises back to its original position and helps to force the air out of the lungs. The breath goes up the wind-pipe over the vocal cords, where the vibrations produce the initial tones.

Place your fingers just under the ribs, in front, and notice how the walls of your stomach press out and fall back with the action of the diaphragm. Observe a sleeping cat or dog or baby and you will see a very pronounced rhythmic action.

Lie on your back, breathe easily, place your hand on your stomach, and you will feel the same rise and fall. Nature has made us, in this position, proof against lazy, shallow breathing. Sit up, focus your breathing at the stomach and see if you are getting the same effect. Do not allow the chest or the shoulders to rise. The distention should be felt at the lower ribs and around the waist line.

Women, especially, because of tight clothing sometimes get the habit of only half filling the lungs. Men, too, become careless because of cramped positions at desks or too little physical alertness. This kind of breathing will sustain life after a fashion, although the lack of fresh air in the lower lungs frequently causes decay and is a prime cause of lung and throat diseases. But it is inadequate for good speaking whether in conversation or on the platform. Tone is affected vitally by the volume and force of the air column that vibrates the chords.