some sort, a vocal utterance in connection with a communal dance or a piece of communal work. In the dance, success in war, in the chase, or in the harvest found utterance physically and psychically. In the work, the rhythmic unity of communal action may have furnished an exhilaration for rapid and continued performance. The community at play, controlled by the rhythmic life of the body, united in a dance movement, while they sang crude songs and acted out in a representative way the scenes celebrated.

At first the songs were, perchance, but vague sounds. Then and gradually a few words, repeated over and over again, were used. These words responded in rhythmic movement to the action of the body. Thus, perhaps, poetry was born.

It is interesting in this connection to see how differently this same matter is handled by different authors. Professor F. B. Gummery, in his "Beginnings of Poetry," puts it in this way (he is speaking of "Rhythm as the Essential Fact of Poetry"): "It is not hard to follow so plain a hint as one finds in the ethnological evidence; the actual habit of individual composition and performance has sprung from choral composition and performance. An entertainer and audience, an artist artist and a public, take for granted preceding social conditions; and it is generally admitted that social conditions begin with the festal dance, as well as with communal labor. Where and when the individual recitative became a thing of prominence, as it undoubtedly did, is a matter to be studied in the individual and centrifugal impulse, in the progress of the poet; hence it is enough to show that rhythmic verse came directly from choral song, and that neither the choral song nor any regular song, could have come from the recitative. They need a developed stage of speech when the logical sen

tence has shaken itself free, to some extent, of mere emotional cadence and almost of meaningless repetitions. Here indeed begin the orator, the teller of tales, the artistic poet; but dance, song and poetry itself begin with communal consent, which is expressed by the most exact rhythm."

Mr. H. B. Alexander dissents somewhat from the above in this work, "Poetry and the Individual." Where he is speaking of the Evolution of the Poetic Spirit," he says: "The characteristics of this early consciousness are apparent: first, interest absorbed by the immediate object of the attention; second, communal inspired expression. But in the instances cited-co-operative labor and the dance-we are in the presence of some advancement in the social evolution. Song could hardly have been brought forth from chance congregations of paleolithic savages except the instinct and need for it already existed in the individual. We must conceive a leader of the primeval chorus. All the bright day he follows the chase. He sees a haughty roebuck startled in the glade. It leaps away in terror, the bough-filtered light of the sun flecking the satiny haunches. The buck! The bounding buck! He hurls his flintpointed dart; and turning away with his prize, he fashions a little song celebrating the one event that has made his day worth living: 'O the buck! The bounding buck! And at night beside the feast-fire, he repeats it till all take up the chorus." Whichever view of the matter is taken, it is fair to assume that in the communal performance, at play or at toil, and more probably the former, may be found the protoplasmic material out of which has sprung every phase of public speaking. In the social evolution of the community, the individual singer, actor, dancer, or worker more and more performed solo for the admiration or information.

of his fellows, and they may have joined in the choral response. A further evolution would lead to a segragation in art, and speaking, singing, acting and dancing would each have become a separate art. This highly probable process in the development of public speaking should be kept in mind in the study of every phase of the subject for it must help to furnish some explanation of its present condition, and of the evolutionary growth of the individual.

So much for the origin of the speech arts Whatever else is kept in mind, this one fact at least should be remembered, namely, the speech arts are the children of emotional states. In the child and in the childhood of the race they are instinctive, subconscious, generally playful outbursts of emotional states which must find expression.

Now, when the nature of these arts is considered, a point is reached where there is still greater diversity of opinion and almost unwarranted diversity of nomenclature. In searching for the scientific basis of the speech arts, a process which is common to all of them will alone receive attention, namely, vocal expression.

From an elementary standpoint, vocal expression in speech is the manifestation of mind through matter where matter is the human voice. This voice, the medium of vocal expression, is a form of sound. The principal material in which an art works must determine, in a large measure, the character of the art. The art of vocal expression in speech depends upon a specific sound, the human voice, for its nature. It follows, then, that in the elementary qualities and attributes of sound a basis may be had for the science of vocal expression.

Sound in its most elementary form, so far as man's sensuous relation to it is concerned, is a

sensation. This is excited by the vibration of bodies external to the brain. This vibratory motion is communicated to the brain through the organ of hearing. Every sensation, whether of seeing, hearing, or what not, must have certain attributes which serve to awaken consciousness and give it definite character: first, there must be something about every sensation which will distinguish it from every other sensation; second, a sensation must continue long enough to be recognized; third, a sensation must be strong enough, must have a sufficiently high degree of intensity to identify it.

For example, a sound sensation must have first, pitch, which serves two purposes, to give it both form and character; second, it must continue long enough to make an impression upon consciousness; third, it must have sufficient volume to be heard. Without these three attributes a sensation would fail to be recognized and distinguished, that is, there would be no sensation. Vocal expression, then, from the very nature of the human voice and the method by which the sound is communicated, will be characterized by changes in pitch, time and intensity. To the one or the other of these three elements can every phase of vocal expression be traced. It will be well, then, at this point to examine carefully the general nature of these elements.

As to the nature of pitch, it may be said to affect sound in two ways: first, there is a fundamental tone which appeals most strongly to the ear and acts as the determining pitch; second, every sound is composite in character due to resonance. A sound of one pitch is never heard. The ear of the untrained listener may not note any but the pitch of the fundamental tone. But every sound producing body is resonant. Resonance is the sympathetic vibration of bodies which respond to

a given sound. The parts of the sound producing instrument may respond. Resonant bodies near at hand may do the same, and these responses reinforce the original sound with tones of varying pitches and intensities, some higher than the original or fundamental tone. This blended tone which in its component parts appeals only to the trained ear, this composite, with its fundamental and its higher, or over-tones, is the combined tone which gives what is called quality to the voice. Pitch, then, by its two-fold manifestations provides a basis for two great departments of vocal expression. These departments from the very character of the bases will naturally take these terms: Speech-Melody and Speech-Quality.

With this audience any detail in this matter is unnecessary. It has been long recognized that aside from the mere words, which may be called the symbolic language, changes in pitch are a natural language for conveying intellectual and emotional concepts. Speech-Melody may be defined, then, in two ways: first, mechanically or physically, it is the variation of the pitch of the voice in utterance; second, psychically, it is the response in the pitch of the voice to the variety of thought and feeling. Speech-Melody has been placed first here in the order of departments because, aside from the words, it is essential to the conveying of the intellectual phase of the thought which is the first thing needful in normal conditions of vocal expression. In fact, its action may change the whole thought without a change of words. That what is said be clearly understood is a primary requisite and nothing about the action of the voice contributes so much to this end as the changes in pitch. In writing and speaking, clearness is the great fundamental element of style. A failure to convey the real meaning of the the thought is the worst kind of speech failure.