The national advanced speaker. A collection of carefully chosen, available. modern declamations and recitations

Front matter

Book.

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Preface

It is now generally conceded that declamation and recitation as school exercises are productive of many substantial advantages. They improve the manner. They aid in obtaining self-command. They develop the ability to think and speak extemporaneously or otherwise in public. They strengthen the memory. They help to form a literary taste. They are a practice which, if studiously and systematically pursued, produces a pleasant speaking or reading voice, a distinct articulation, a clear enunciation, accomplishments in any one who possesses them, and of inestimable value to those in public or professional life.

A " Speaker " ought, logically, to be constructed with a view to developing and securing these results : and declamation and recitation should be, comparatively, as much of a study in schools as spelling or mathematics. Unfortunately, the Speakers now in use are, with few exceptions, of small practical utility as such ; while declaiming and reciting are too generally regarded by pupils as an imposition, or, at best, as only a momentary diversion. In the compilation of Speakers the radical mistakes have been made, (1) of proceeding upon the theory that good speaking-pieces are necessarily and chiefly to be found in the works of a few great orators and writers ; and (2) of presenting selections taken mainly from those writers and orators only.

vi PREFACE.

The result generally has been that Speakers have been made up of a small number of good pieces that have become unattractive by familiarity and long use, with a large number ill suited or wholly unsuited to the purpose.

Again, the idea has been very prevalent with teachers and pupils, that speaking is a species of drama: that a good speaking-piece is one which affords large opportunity for theatrical attitudes and effects ; and that the best speaking is that which comes nearest the representations and delineations of the stage. Undoubtedly many excellent declamations and recitations are more or less dramatic in style, and may be profitably and successfully used with a certain amount of incidental dramatic effect : but it is by no means true that the best speakers are the most dramatic, or that the best selections are the most sensational, or that the final and best results of elocutionary work are in the direction of the stage.

The legitimate and proper end of elocutionary training in schools is to produce natural, intelligent, effective speakers, whatever their profession or calling may ultimately be ; and this can be accomplished only by persistent study and practice of pieces varied in thought, style, sentiment, and sentential structure. The attempt has been made in preparing this book to bring together a collection of such pieces : pieces selected with reference to their intrinsic literary excellence, but primarily and especially with reference to their suitability as declamations and recitations. They have been selected from a large number of authors, and present a wide range of style. They are conveniently short. They are pieces that " speak well," as demonstrated by actual test : and as such will help to make good speakers.. Many of the

PREFACE. vii selections are new. Many are from modern and contemporary orators and writers. Some, taken from well-known authors, are here for the first time made available by abridgment and condensation. All of them, it is believed, possess positive merits as oratorical and rhetorical productions.

The compiler is under especial obligations to Harper & Brothers, the Century Company, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Jansen, McClurg & Company, and Good Cheer, for their courteous permission to make selections from works protected by their copyrights.

Oliver E. Branch.

New York City, 1886.

AUTHORS

PAGE

Abbott, Lyman 128

Acta Columbiana 6

Adams, Charles Francis . . 265

Aldrich, T. B 43, 145

Abnold, Matthew 169

Ballabd, H. H 296

Bancroft, George 282

Bayne, Peteb 259, 279

Bellows, H. W. . 263

Beltzhoover, F. E 28

Blackwood's Magazine 247

Blaine, J. G 215

Blair, A. L 22

Bright, John 50, 223

Brooks, Phillips 172, 196

Bbown, H. A 191

Bbown, Frances 239

Bbown, Theron 266

Brownell, H. H 40

Buchanan, Robert 195

Cable, Geo. W 262

Calhoun, J. C 6

Cableton, Guy 217

Cablyle, Thomas 8, 76, 208,

245, 278

Chambebs' Journal .234

Channing, Wm. E 166

PAGE

Collyeb, Robert 295

Coudeet, F. R 31

Cox, S. S 209

Curtis, M. M 190

Desprez, Frank 224

De Witt, Wm. H 102

Dobson, Austin 96

Dommett, Alfred 258

Dublin Univebsity Magazine 175

Duval, Harry C 276

Emerson, Ralph Waldo . . . 281

Ebskine, Lord 157

Everett, Edward 42

Fiske, John 150

Frothingham, O.B 66

Garfield, J. A 89, 206

Gassaway, F. H 59

George, M. W 97, 159

George, Henry 56, 235

Golden Age 108

Good Cheer 293, 296

Greeley, Hob ace 74

Guiney, L. 1 1S6

Hamilton, James 71

Habper's Monthly . 69, 255, 267

Hayne, Robert Y 254

(ix)

AUTHORS.

PAGE

Head, F. H 112

Hoar, Geo. F 199

Holmes, O. W 78, 132

Howe, W. W .238

Hott, A. S 61

Hugo, Victor . 52, 99

Jackson, Helen H 211

Janes, C. F 13

Klnglake, Alex. W... .148, 291

Locke, Clinton 52

Long, John D 10, 180

Love, William DeLoss .... 288 Macaulat. . . .40, 86, 134, 168

McAlpine, R. W 69

Meredith, Owen 103

Mommsen, Theodore 286

Mollton, Louise C 285

Nadaud, Gustaye 15

Nye, Bill 57

O'Brien, Fitz James 114

O'Brien, J. W 1

Ohto State Journal 221

Palmer, F. W. 237

Pearson, Charles 270

PAGE

Phillips, Charles 139

Porter, L. L 152

Prescott, Wm. H 269

Rame, Louisa De La 160

Rewey, E. M 54

Robertson, Frederick W..273 Sangster, Margaret E . . . . 293

Schurz, Carl 107

Scoyille, D. C 21

Scrtbner's Monthly 137

Searle, C. H 91, 131

Seymour, Horatio 125

Smith, B. G 174

Stedman, E. C 153

Stimson, H. A 73, 231

Storrs, R. S 38, 110

Stryker, M. W 62, 183

Swinburne, A. C 33

Talmage, T. DeWitt 143

Thornbur&, Walter 173

Upson, A. J 120

Vilas, Wm. F 49, 242

Webster, Daniel 4, 261

Whipple, E. P 284

Wood, M. C 121