pauses and vigorous touches, expressing all your feeling and allowing yourself time to see and enjoy every word.

A PRAYER

Teach me, Father, how to go
Softly as the grasses grow;
Hush my soul to meet the shock
Of the wild world as a rock.
But my spirit propt with power
Make as simple as a flower.
Let the dry heart fill its cup
Like a poppy looking up;

Let life lightly wear her crown

Like a poppy looking down,

When its heart is filled with dew

And its life begins anew.

Teach me, Father, how to be

Kind and patient as a tree.

Joyfully the crickets croon
Under shady oak at noon;
Beetle on his mission bent
Tarries in that cooling tent.
Let me also cheer a spot
Hidden field or garden grot
Place where passing souls can rest
On the way and be their best.

From "Man with the Hoe," and other poems.
By permission of the author.

Edwin Markham

By hurry, that is, by slighting the pauses, slighting these rhythmic pulsations, or alternations of pause and touch, we find we can render a very fine passage indifferently and flippantly.

"October."

O suns and skies and clouds of June,

And flowers of June together,

Ye can not rival for one hour

October's bright blue weather.

Helen Hunt Jackson

We can run together in reading the words of the whole first line of the preceding, as careless readers will do; or we can make " suns stand out as a definite picture and idea, and skies " and "clouds and "June" and "flowers." Then we shall pause long after "October " to let that idea sink in and to show its contrast with the other.

Observe the effect of reading the last line all together in a jumble; then, of making two pulsations in your mind, a strong one upon "October" and, after pausing intensely and joyously, another upon the last three words. This gives you a chance to put feeling into the last three words and to bring out an admiration for October even greater than that for June.

Not only where the rainbow glows,
Nor in the song of woman heard,
But in the darkest, meanest things

There alway, alway something sings.

'T is not in the high stars alone,
Nor in the cups of budding flowers,

Nor in the redbreast's mellow tone,

Nor in the bow that smiles in showers,
But in the mud and scum of things

There alway, alway something sings.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

Give these words from Emerson with all of his intense earnestness, his deep love for nature, his discovery of beauty in small things. Read them not as one who found every little thing disagreeable, but as one who discovers in the very smallest flower, even in the mud by the brookside or in the road, something that calls for our deep wonder.

In rendering something that is intensely beautiful, that we feel deeply, we often pause and give a very vigorous touch in the centre of each successive phrase. Observe in the poem by Phillips Brooks, how we move from idea to idea with decision and vigor. Note in the last stanza how we go more slowly in the intensity of prayer.

BETHLEHEM

O little town of Bethlehem,

How still we see thee lie!
Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
The silent stars go by;

Yet in thy dark streets shineth
The everlasting light;

The hopes and fears of all the years
Are met in thee tonight.

For Christ is born of Mary,
And gathered all above,

While mortals sleep, the angels keep
Their watch of wond'ring love.
O morning stars, together

Proclaim the holy birth!

And praises sing to God the King
And peace to men on earth.

How silently, how silently,

The wondrous gift is given!
So God imparts to human hearts
The blessings of his heaven.
No ear may hear His coming,
But in this world of sin,

Where meek souls will receive him still,
The dear Christ enters in.

O holy child of Bethlehem!
Descend to us, we pray;
Cast out our sin, and enter in;
Be born in us to-day.
We hear the Christmas angels
The great glad tidings tell;
O come to us, abide with us,
Our Lord Emanuel!

Phillips Brooks.

In talking and in the natural reading of such lines as the preceding, if you bring out one idea after another, you show where your attention is located by the phrase accent; and in passing from idea to idea you indicate the genuineness of your thinking by changes of pitch.

Is there anything else which you find in the modulations of your voice in speaking a single sentence?

In addition to showing attention (by pause and touch), and discrimination (by change of pitch), you show the connection of each idea with other ideas.

Try reading a sentence with the voice on a dead level and observe whether you bring out the relations of words. Then genuinely think each idea, letting your voice act freely to convey the full meaning of your sentence. What are these leaps and skips or free actions of your voice that show the relation or connection of your ideas with one another?

In battles the eye is the first to overcome.

You will find that as you read naturally any sentence or passage your voice changes pitch not only between phrases and words, but also during the utterance of the central vowel of a word. We find such a bend of the voice on the central vowel of practically every word we speak. This modulation of the voice is called inflexion.

If you speak words indifferently or without thinking, these bends or inflexions are less marked. In proportion

to the genuineness of your thinking and to your earnestness they become more pronounced.

Truth alone makes life rich and great.

Emerson

For another illustration, observe a group of children who hear a distant train. One of them makes a sound like a whistle. This is on one pitch and is like singing. But another calls to his companions "Run" or "Train" and gives a decided falling inflexion upon that word.

Repeat a college yell as you have heard it on the ball field. Note as you say it that the "rahs are practically on one pitch, but that the name of the college receives a very definite falling inflexion.

It is very important that you should give attention to sounds in nature and to the way people speak, that you may know through your ear what your own voice does. You ought to study to distinguish:

1. Between the tones in singing and in speaking, or song and inflexion.

2. Between rising and falling inflexions.

3. Between long and short rising or falling inflexions. 4. Between gradual and abrupt rising or falling inflexions. 5. Between straight rising and straight falling inflexions and compound rising or falling inflexions. (Sometimes called circumflex.)

6. Between a narrow range in speaking and a wide reach of the voice; and all the elements of a wide range of voice. Listen quietly and make illustrations and all kinds of marks to stand for these. Let your voice follow these until you can distinguish all of them. Study to find the meaning of all these. Search for the mental cause of every one. Speak some short sentence in twenty ways and note that the subtlest modulation has its source in the way you think. Such observation will enable you to enjoy music, the songs of birds, the murmuring of brooks, and the beautiful speech of educated and refined people. You can learn also to please people and to interest them by your talking, reading or telling of stories.

What do these bends of the voice in talking mean? Lis