The Canadian Elocutionist | Page 9

joy!

When earth, and sky, and air, are glowing all
With gayety and life,
and pensive shades
Of morning loveliness are cast around!
The
purple clouds, so streaked with crimson light,
Bespeak the coming of
majestic day;--
Mark how the crimson grows more crimson still,

While, ever and anon, a golden beam
Seems darting out its radiance!

Heralds of day! where is that mighty form
Which clothes you all in
splendour, and around
Your colourless, pale forms spreads the bright
hues
Of heaven?--He cometh from his gorgeous couch,
And gilds
the bosom of the glowing east!"
Margaret Davidson.
2.
Sweet was the sound, when oft at evening's close
Up yonder hill the
village murmur rose;
There, as I passed with careless steps and slow

The mingling notes came softened from below;
The swain
responsive as the milk-maid sung,
The sober herd that lowed to meet
their young;
The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool,
The playful
children just let loose from school;
The watch-dog's voice that bayed
the whispering wind,
And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind;


These all in sweet confusion sought the shade,
And filled each
pause the nightingale had made.
But now the sounds of population
fail,
No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale,
No busy steps the
grass-grown footway tread,
For all the blooming flush of life is fled.

All but yon widowed, solitary thing,
That feebly bends beside the
plashy spring;
She, wretched matron--forced in age, for bread,
To
strip the brook with mantling cresses spread,
To pick her wintry fagot
from the thorn,
To seek her nightly shed and weep till morn--
She
only left of all the harmless train,
The sad historian of the pensive
plain!
Goldsmith.
OROTUND QUALITY.
The Orotund is a highly improved state of the Natural voice, and is the
quality most used, being far more expressive, as it gives grandeur and
energy to thought and expression. This voice is highly agreeable, and is
more musical and flexible than the common voice.
Dr. Rush defines the Orotund as that assemblage of eminent qualities
which constitute the highest characteristic of the speaking voice. He
describes it to be a full, clear, strong, smooth, and ringing sound, rarely
heard in ordinary speech; but which is never found in its highest
excellence, except by careful cultivation. He describes the fine qualities
of voice constituting the Orotund in the following words:--
By a fullness of voice, is meant the grave or hollow volume, which
approaches to hoarseness.
By a freedom from nasal murmur and aspiration.
By a satisfactory loudness and audibility.
By smoothness, or a freedom from all reedy or guttural harshness.
By a ringing sonorous quality of voice resembling certain musical

instruments.
The possession of the power of this voice is greatly dependent on
cultivation and management, and experiments have proved that more
depends on cultivation than on natural peculiarity. Much care and
labour are necessary for acquiring this improved condition of the
speaking voice, the lungs must be kept well supplied with breath, there
must be a full expansion of the chest, causing the abdomen gently to
protrude, the throat and the mouth must be kept well open so as to give
free course to the sound. Never waste the breath, every pause must be
occupied in replenishing the lungs, and the inhalation should be done as
silently as possible, and through the nostrils as well as by the mouth.
Excellence in this quality of voice depends on the earnest and frequent
practice of reading aloud with the utmost degree of force. The voice
may be exerted to a great extent without fatigue or injury, but should
never be taxed beyond its powers, and as soon as this strong action can
be employed without producing hoarseness, it should be maintained for
half an hour at a time.
This practice is very beneficial to the health, especially if prosecuted in
the open air, or in a large, well ventilated room, and if pursued
regularly, energetically, and systematically, the pupil will be surprised
and delighted at his rapid progress in this art, and his voice, from a
condition of comparative feebleness, will soon develop into one of
wellmarked strength, fullness, and distinctness.
1.
Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow
Adown enormous
ravines slope amain,--
Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice,

And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!
Motionless
torrents! silent cataracts!
Who made you glorious as the gates of
heaven
Beneath the keen, full moon? Who bade the sun
Clothe you
with rainbows? Who, with living flowers
Of loveliest blue, spread
garlands at your feet!--
God! let the torrents, like a shout of nations,

Answer! and let the ice-plains echo, God!--
And they, too, have a

voice,--yon piles of snow,
And in their perilous fall shall thunder,
God!
Coleridge.
2.
The hoarse, rough voice, should like a torrent roar.
3.
Hurrah! the foes are moving. Hark to the mingled din
Of fife, and
steed, and trump, and drum, and roaring culverin. The fiery duke is
pricking fast across Saint Andre's plain, With all the hireling chivalry
of Guelders