This rather curious piece of composition was once placed upon a blackboard at a teachers' institute, and a prize, a Webster's Dictionary, was offered to any person who could read and pronounce every word correctly. The book was not carried off, however, as twelve was the lowest number of mistakes in the pronunciation made:

"A sacrilegious son of Belial, who suffered from bronchitis, having exhausted his finances, in order to make good the deficit, resolved to ally himself to a comely, lenient, and docile young lady of the Malay or Caucasian race. He accordingly purchased a calliope and a coral necklace of a chameleon hue, and securing a suite of rooms at a principal hotel he engaged the head waiter as a coadjutor. He then dispatched a letter of the most exceptional caligraphy extant, inviting the young lady to a matinée. She revolted at the idea, refused to consider herself sacrificeable to his desires, and sent a polite note of refusal; on receiving which he procured a carbine and a bowie-knife, said that he would

not now forge letters hymeneal with the queen, went to an isolated spot, severed his jugular vein and discharged the contents of the carbine into his abdomen. The debris was removed by the coroner."

CHAPTER V

MELODY

DEFINITIONS. Melody in speech may be defined as a pleasing succession of changes in pitch.

Pitch is a term applied to the position of the tone relative to the key-note. It is dependent on the number of vibrations per second. The greater the number of vibrations the higher the pitch. The number of vibrations is dependent on the tension, thickness and length of the vibrating body.

In the production of vocal sound, our vocal cords vibrate with a certain rapidity. And the pitch of our voice depends on the thickness, length, and tension of these cords. The pitch is also slightly modified by the size of the resonating chambers, but this seldom does more than sharp or flat a certain note.

Compass. The human voice has a certain range which lies between the highest and lowest limits. In the ordinary individual, this range seldom reaches two octaves. The conventional voice seldom varies more than one octave, and the reading voice is usually limited to a range of two or three

notes.

Key. The predominating tone or pitch of the voice in speaking is called the key. It may also be defined as the average pitch the individual uses; this ordinarily varies. from the high soprano voice of girls to the bass voice of boys. Your normal key should be a tone near which you can speak with greatest ease.

Inflection. Inflection refers to the bend or wave of the voice above or below the key. The Slide denotes a pro