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discontinue the dangerous contest . His answer has the true smack of An < Ao- American Jack-Tar courtesy : —" Tou be d—d ; for -what you pay ( one piastre ) , you may as well all go to h—11 . Fire !—fireman , you there ! more lard'in the furnace I" Their position now became fearful , when one of the passengers put an end to it by levelling a musket at the rival helmsman . The poor fellow dropped the wheel , and fell frightfully wounded . This book requires no further recommendation from us than the analysis here given . ^ Since the perusal of Livingstone ' s " -Africa" we have read no traveller's journal with more instruction and pleasure . It is eminently sujxgestive , too . We see a Texan , bishop presiding over a vast diocese ,
sheltered in an episcopal palace composed of " three wretched huts , " but overshadowed by fig-trees , bananas , rose-laurels , grenades , and citrons . His entire worldly riches are at one time comprised in the sum of twenty-five p iastres , fifteen of which he contributes to the erection cf Pomenech's intended church . A Jew voluntarily offers five piastres , a Jewish lady of rank , who had just purchased a ball dress , being made acquainted with the Mission ' s poverty , presented it as & contribution for the same purpose . " I subsequently , " ssiys the abbe , * converted it into two beautiful white chasubles . " Noble example for Catholics , to see this Jewish lady foregoing all the pleasures of the ball , to aid a Catholic priest in his labour of charity !
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EXTEMPORE SPEAKIN G The Art of Extempore Speaking ; Hints for the JPuIpit , the Senate , and the Bar . By M . Bautain , Vicar-General , and Professor at the Sorbonne , &c . Translated from the French . Bosworth and Harrison , QTiiE want of a system of oratory is no new one , nor can the Vicar-General claim originality in the attempt to supply it . The very preamble of Aristotle ' s bulky treatise recites , that . " all , to a certain extent , attempt as well to sift as to maintain * an argument ; as well to defend themselves as to impeach . Now , of the multitude , some dp this at random ; others , byreason of practice , from habit ; but as it is possible either way , it is plain that the case will admit of our reducing these things to a system . ' And how diligently he laboured to fill the void , which it would seem was , even
in his time , acknowledged , is it not in the memory of those whose souls taye been vexed with either the original or its Oxford translation from ¦ which , we have extracted the preceding passage ? But how fruitless , again , liaye been that immortal treatise , as well as the " Brief " of Thomas Hobbes —which alone is longer than M . Bautain ' s tract— is sufficiently shown by the inefficiency , as public speakers , even after considerable preparation , of the great majority of those who > , attempting no higher flight than " communiaproprie dicere" attract our sympathy when the note-book or sermoncase is mislaid , or the attack of the debater comes from an unexpected v £ uarter . But a few : days since , while dangling in the gilded halls of palaces , as the Chancellor of the Exchequer might peri p hrastieally term listening to some evidence in a now , alas ! pestilent parliamentary committee-room , it was our fate to interchange ideas upon the subject before the committee with a
worthy knight of a certain shire . The honourable member was evidently well up in his subjects ; had not only views , but sound ones , very far ahead of the " loose ideas" and u vague impressions" which formed the staple of information upon it amongst inembers without-side the mysterious veil of office . We expressed natural surprise -that this crystallized knowledge was allowed to slumber ; but , witli rueful face , our friend assured us that , although he had taken great interest in the matter , and though from his age , character , and position he might hope for an attentive and considerate hearing , still , whenever the subject turned up , it was always in some such form that the prearranged scheme of an oration he had carried for years in his head , or , it may be , in his pocket , c < would never fit in . " It was said , again , of a late member for a large borough constituency—and , we believe , most truly said—that he had not for years gone down to the House on n
financial night without such a speech cut and dry as must have carried him on to the Treasury benches ; but it is no less the fact that this speech was never delivered , and the country has never gained the servieesof one of tho most able of financiers . All tltose whom melancholy fate compels to sit for hours and hours in " the gallery" at tbe unrequited task of manufacturing orations , and loudest of all , perhaps , the Speaker himself , will bear witness that if the palmy days of Uritish senatorial oratory are not past , or to come , they are to a certainty not present . Again , the general inferiority of our pulpit eloquence is so widely admitted to lessen tho influence of ministers of the Established Church , that we hear of professors of elocution , who not only lecture to lairge auul attentive audiences in town and country , but find eager private pupils among some of the clergy , whose means enable them to attempt tho attainment of a gift whicli may be acquired by such as have time , and will , and heart , and brains . For , as tho learned author saya , in discouragement of mnemonics or artificial memory , —
If your address be the expression of an idea fraught with life , it will develop itself naturally , as plants germinate , as animals grow , through the sustained action of a vital force , by an incessant organic operation , by tlie effusion of a living principle It ought to issue from tho depths of the houI , as tho stream from its swims—ex ct 6 un * ~ d < i > Ui& cordu oa loquitur , out of tlie fulness of tho heart tho mouth aponketh . But a heart there must be ; and in that heart n fulness of . feelin-r , inamit ' esting itself by u plenitude of ideas , which will givo ia its turn plenitude of expression . The mouth speuks with ease when the heart is full ; but if it is empty , the head tukes its office , and it is the haul which has recourse t > these artificial means , for want of tha inspiration whicli fails it . 11 Fiunt orutorcd , nnscuntur poctoo , " aaith Quintilian , whosii bulky Institutes of Oratory , by the way , arc additional evidence of tho labour comparatively still-bom boloro tlio invention of priming , devoted to the systematizing of oratory ami of thinking too ; and M . Buutuin , takimr the mind of the pupil for granted , endeavours in the work before us to induce uiuau cultivate aim tne natural
* o develop qualities necessary to improvisation who have the good fortune to possess them ; and desires , above all , to point out tho signs by which any one may discover whether he be capable of speaking in public , and how , in bo doing , he may succeed . ijW
teaching to enlighten and train the people , whether bj- the addresses of scientific men or of ministers of religion : the latter of wliom , teaching in tlie name of thp Almighty , must unremittingly remind men of their last end , of the best means with which to meet it , making their earthly and transitory interest subordinate to their celestial and everlasting happiness . Here , then , -we have four great fields in which men are daily called on to speak in public , in order there to discuss the cravest interests of society , of family , and of individuals , or else to unfold truths more or less lofty , often hard to comprehend or to admit , and the knowledge or conviction of ¦ which is of the highest moment to the welfare of society and persons .
By the very fact of social organization , and springing out of its forms thPr " ™ constantly cases in which you may be called to speak in public , on ' account « f ? £ * position which you fill or the duties which you discharge . Thus , committees , -V ? constantly exist in which are discussed state or municipal interests , and deliber t * or board-room resolutions are passed by a majority of votes . There will alwava h * council of state , general and borough councils , legislative assemblies , parliament .: * Jt committees of a hundred sorts . In the second place , there will alwjWs be tribu 1 where justice is dispensed , and where the interests of individuals in collision wi « those of the public , or . with one another , have to be contended for before judees whnm you must seek to convince or persuade . There will always be a system of nuKV
This elegant writer then treats at length of the qualifications for oratory of the conception , preparation , and arrangement of a plan of intellectual and bodily preparation for speaking—although these be little in harmony with the idea of improvisation and of the discourse itself—with felicity and eloquence . He opens his twentieth chapter on " the Beginning or Exordium , " wittily enough with the observation of the confidant in the coniedy of Les JPlaidews— " What I know best is my opening "—and leads his reader gracefully along to the peioration in the twenty-fourth chapter , where we find a few sentences which must be so universally felt and acknowledged to be true , in fact , so old and stale , as some would say , yet withal so nu-ely put that , if not for the amusement of the reader , at least for his possible benefit we extract them : — 3
If it is difficult to begin , when one extemporises ; it is still more difficult to finish —that is , to finish ' well . Most orators spoil their speeches by lengtlriness , and prolixity is the principal disadvantage of extemporaneous speaking . In it , more than in any other , one wants time to be brief , and there is a perpetual risk of being carried away by tlie movement of the thoughts or the expressions . It sometimes happens , .. unfortunately , tliat you are barely into your subject when you should end ; and then , with a confused feeling of all that you have omitted , and a sense of what you might still say , you are anxious to recover lost ground in some degree , and you begin some new development when you ought to be concluding . This tardy nnd unseasonable yet crude after-growth has the very worst effect upon the audience , which , already fatigued , becomes impatient and listens no longer . The speaker loses his words and his trouble , and everything he adds by way of elucidating or corroborating what he has said , spoils what has gone before , destroying the impression of it . He repeats himself unconsciously , and those who still listen to him'follow
mm with uneasiness , as men watch from shore a bark which ; . seeks to make port and cannot . It is a less evil to turn short round . and finish , abruptly than thus to tack incessantly without advancing . For the greatest of a speaker ' s misfortunes is that he should bore . The bored hearer becomes almost an enemy . iVn unseasonable or awkward speaker inflicts a downright torture on those who are compelled to he , ar him , a torture that may amount to sickness or a nervous paroxysm . Such is the state into which , a too lengthy discourse , and , above all , a never-ending peroration , plunge tlie audience . It is easy to calculate the dispositions it inspires and the fruit it produces . ¦ Sometimes—and I humbly confess that I here speak from experience—the orator is still ' more . unfortunate , if that were possible . He wants to finish , and no longer knows how , like a man who seeks to quit a house in danger , and finds all the doors shut ; he l
runs ight and left to discover an escape , and strikes against dead walls . Meanwhile , time presses , and the impatience of the public betrays itself by a repressed disturbance , some rising to go away , some moving on their seats , while a confused hum . ascends towards the speaker—a too certain token that he is no longer attended to , and that he is sspeaking to the air , which fact only increases his agitation and perplexity . At last , as everything has an end in this world , he reaches his conclusion after some fashion or other , and war-weary , either by catching hold of the commonplace wind-up about eternal life , should he "be preaching , or , under other circumstances , by some panting period which has the air of expressing a feeling or a thought , and winch in nine cases out of ten fills the ear -with sonorous and empty words . And thus the poor ovator who could do better , and who is conscious that he has done ill , retires with lowly mien , much confused , and vowing , though rather late , that they shall not catuh him in that way any more .
Alas ! yet again , perhaps , shall they so catch him , even after tho most laborious preparation ; for there is nothing so fitful an eloquence . It needs but nn omission , ji distraction , to break tho tliread of ideas and launch you into void or darkness , find then you grope in a forest , or rather struggle amid a chaos . It is a true oratorical discomfiture and rout . Reader , if ever them hast floundered in the Maelstrom of a suspended peroration , or gone astray after ai Jack-a-lain torn idea in the wood of foggy conclusions , tie te /' abuUt uarratur—tlie -voice from the Sorbonne may profit thec . Wo cannot conclude our brief notice without a word of praise for thu translator .
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THE DEFENCE OP CAWNPORE . The Defence of' Cawnpore . By Lieut .-Coloiml John Adye , C . H ., Royal Artillery . Longman and Co , It will be remembered- —although tho tremendous dimensions of the Indian intelligence and tho rapidity of communication now-u-dnys cause sad confusion in civilian recollections of facts connected with the war—that tlie Hero of tho Lledait was censured gravely by certain Indian correspondents for his arrangements while in charge of Cawnpuro from the 2 Gtli to the ' 29 th of November last during the absence of Sir Colin Campbellthen an route
, lor the relief of Lucknow . A great number of the public hastened , us u mutter of course , to pull down the popular idol , whose position , as a pet of the aristocracy , indeed , served materially to wlict the tooth of envy and the sharp sword of detraction . It was assumed Bonuswlwit hastily that tlio general wsis in disgrace with Sir Colin . This grunted , it followed that ho mud have , buun grievously to liluma ; und this again granted , he becamcj a dreadful example of favouritism , and tl » o wickedness of those who appoint mere nreentei'ri to responsible ' commands . In time , however , the Commander-in-Chief in India stops out of his wivy to thank his subordinate , and repair , as ho
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644 THE LEADER . [ No . 432 , July 3 , 1858 .
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), July 3, 1858, page 644, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2249/page/20/
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