Page images
PDF
EPUB

"Just then I became dizzy. My scalp had been lifted by the stroke of the Russian's sabre, the skin of my cheek cleft across to my upper lip, and I fainted from loss of blood.

"When my time expired in the cavalry I re-enlisted in this regiment. I am always proud to hear myself called one of the six hundred, but-poor Jack! fill that glass again, Tom."

Thus ended the sergeant's story of the famous charge.

SOLEMNITY.

Moderate and Long Pauses.

76.

[From James G. Blaine's Oration on Garfield.]

GARFIELD.

Surely, if happiness can ever come from the honors or triumphs of this world, on that quiet July morning James A. Garfield may well have been a happy man. No foreboding of evil haunted him; no slightest premonition of danger clouded his sky. His terrible fate was upon him in an instant. One moment he stood erect, strong, confident in the years stretching peacefully out before him. The next he lay wounded, bleeding, helpless, doomed to weary weeks of torture, to silence, and the grave.

For no

Great in life, he was surpassingly great in death. cause, in the very frenzy of wantonness and wickedness, by the red hand of murder, he was thrust from the full tide of this world's interest, from its hopes, its aspirations, its victories, into the visible presence of death and he did not quail. Not alone for the one short moment in which, stunned and dazed, he could give up life, hardly aware of its relin

[ocr errors]

quishment, but through days of deadly languor, through weeks of agony, that was not less agony because silently borne, with clear sight and calm courage, he looked into his open grave. What blight and ruin met his anguished eyes, whose lips may tell what brilliant, broken plans, what baffled, high ambitions, what sundering of strong, warm, manhood's friendships, what bitter rendering of sweet household ties! Behind him a proud, expectant nation, a great host of sustaining friends, a cherished and happy mother, wearing the full, rich honors of her early toil and tears; the wife of his youth, whose whole life lay in his; the little boys not yet emerged from childhood's day of frolic; the fair young daughter; the sturdy sons just springing into closest companionship, claiming every day and every day rewarding a father's love and care; and in his heart the eager, rejoicing power to meet all demand. Before him, desolation and great darkness! And his soul was not shaken. His countrymen were thrilled with instant, profound, and universal sympathy.

Masterful in his mortal weakness, he became the centre of a nation's love, enshrined in the prayers of a world. But all the love and all the sympathy could not share with him his suffering. He trod the wine-press alone. With unfaltering front he faced death. With unfailing tenderness he took leave of life. Above the demoniac hiss of the assassin's bullet he heard the voice of God. With simple resignation he bowed to the Divine decree.

As the end drew near, his early craving for the sea returned. The stately mansion of power had been to him the wearisome hospital of pain, and he begged to be taken from its prison walls, from its oppressive, stifling air, from its homelessness and hopelessness. Gently, silently, the love of a great nation bore the pale sufferer to the longed-for

healing of the sea, to live or to die, as God should will, within sight of its heaving billows, within sound of its manifold voices. With wan, fevered face tenderly lifted to the cooling breeze, he looked out wistfully upon the ocean's changing wonders; on its fair sails, whitening in the morning light; on its restless waves, rolling shoreward to break and die beneath the noonday sun; on the red clouds of evening, arching low to the horizon; on the serene and shining pathway of the stars. Let us think that his dying eyes read a mystic meaning which only the rapt and parting soul may know. Let us believe that in the silence of the receding world he heard the great waves breaking on a further shore, and felt already upon his wasted brow the breath of the eternal morning.

184. LONG PAUSES.

For examples of Long Pauses, see following selections: "Hamlet's Soliloquy,"

66

Break, Break,

Break," and " Immortality of the Soul "

185. CADENCE.

1. Cadence is a gradual elevation of pitch and increase of force on the third or fourth syllable preceding the last one of a sentence, followed by a lowering of the voice in the discrete or concrete movement two or more notes below the prevailing pitch of the sentiment; as,

to

1. Say nothing that you would be ashamed hear

a

ten

2. One to-day is better than

to

morrows.

3. We must wait for the future, and enjoy

[blocks in formation]

The intervals through which voice passes in changing the pitch from that which prevails in the upward and downward slide, will depend upon the character of the sentiment; tranquil thoughts have but slight and gradual elevation and depression, while the Cadence in violent or intense emotions is abrupt and sweeps through a greater interval of pitch.

187. CLIMAX.

1. The term Climax as used in Elocution is the proper management of all the elements of vocal expression, so as to render correctly and effectively the thought contained in the rhetorical figure known by that name.

2. A sentence containing a Climax is so arranged that each idea rises in importance, force or dignity above that which precedes it. The most forcible periods that have come to us from ancient orators and writers are constructed in this order. The writings of Quintilian, Demosthenes and Cicero abound in this beautiful figure.

3. Sometimes the order of arrangement is reversed, when the figure is called Anti-Climax.

4. The reading of each kind of sentence requires the application of the appropriate element indicated by the sentiment. The changes in the Climax will usually be in the following order: From a Normal to an Abnormal Quality, from Moderate to Full Force, from Middle to High Pitch, and from a Slow or Moderate to a Rapid Movement. The Stress will depend upon the prevailing character of the sentiment. In the AntiClimax, the order of changes will be reversed.

189. Examples: CLIMAX.

1. "In my affection to my country, you find me ever firm and invariable. Not the solemn demand of my person; not the vengeance of the Amphictyonic Council, which they denounced against me; not the terror of their threat'enings; not the flattery of their pro`mises; no, nor the fury of those accursed wretches, whom they roused like wild beasts against me, could ever tear this affection from my breast`."

2. If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop remained in my country I never would lay down my arms; no', never, NEVER, NEVER.

3. And Dou'glas, mo`re, I tell thee here;
He're, in thy pitch of pride;

Here, in thy ho`ld, thy vassals nea`r;
I tell thee thou'rt defied.

189. ANTI-CLIMAX.

1. "What must the king do now,? Must he submit'?

« EelmineJätka »