Kicks On Elocution

Mu. Editor:- The story, when first told, that the auhool board had hired at the rate of $2,750 a year a teacher of elocution for the High School could not at first command belief; it turns out, however, to be true, and further, that the board fearing lest the pupils might not appreciate instruction to be obtained al such cost, has made thelr attendance upon it obligatory. Is the board getting crazy? A year ago they severoly censured their faculty for exocuting a law whioh they themselves had made. What vvould be done in case the pupils should viólate this law and tha teachers should use constraint? But to the subject. What is this elocution that the teacher should be paid at the rate of $500 a year more for teaching it than the head of the school system of the city receives for his services? I remember that a revered pro. fessor in the college where I studied and who was afterwards its president, began some suggestions on the subject of elocution by remarking, "the first requisite of a good elocution is to have sotnething to elocute." This is supposed to be supplied by other teachers than the one who has elocution in charge. What then has this teacher to do'? I will answer this queslion by briefiy indicating how the great men in public speaking have attained to their distinotion. It is said that the old Romans who desired that their sons should be good public speakers, would not permit that as infants they should have nurses who did not speak correctly the Latin language. This suggests the whole process. Children should from the eradle, if possible, hear good languago and only such. They should be made to enuncíate their words perfectly. This practice should be carried thfough every grade of our schools. A recitation on any subject should not be deemed perfect, though its import might be viglit, if the language was incorrect, or the enunciation imperfect. I venture the assertion that the greatest public speakers have been those who, having good matter, utter it in the natural style of a conversation, differing therefrom only by giving the utterance a volume of voice corresponding with the space occupiedby the audience. Any one who teaches a different systom spoils his pupil. Examplos would best state the truth. I would insist upon the case of John Randolph, but for the reason that there is no one living vvho evei' heard him. And yet we might take the opinión of .Tosiah Qaincy, vvho makes Randolph the most perfect parliamentary orator of his time and mak'es his whole manner to have been a mere eopy of an easy conversation. Gerit Smith was regarded as the most perfect public speaker of his day, and the trait vvhich chiefly distinguished him was the perfect enunciation of every word, no one being rura into another. The same is true of Wendall Philips, whom great numbers in this city have heard, and of Charles H. Spurgeon, whom I think some of our people have heard. His distinction, besides the aptness and weight of his matter, was that he simply talked to 7,000 people, so that every person present who had ears heard every word of the discourse. On the other hand, I may say that I have known a great many professional teachers of elocution, and have never known one who was a natural, or inany sense a good public speaker, or who made good ones of any whom he succeeded in getting to follow his rules. The true teachers of elocution, except as to the mere training of the voice, are those who help their pupils to the matter and the rhetoric and logic of their addresses. And this is done by requiring of pupils a correct language ,and a perfect enunciation of its words. It would seern by the terms of the contract, and especially by the salary to be paid, that the new teacher was deemed to possess some witchery by which the pupils were to be so inflated that they could blow up at will a hurricane of eloquence which would carry overything before it. Of course, they know that their children are smart enough, and see no reason, except the want of right kind of teaching, why Patrick Henrys, Randolphs, Franaes E. Willards anc Spurgeons are not springing up every year. It isto be hoped that the electors wil] as early as possible, relieve from duty thO9e who have imposed upon them such an expense for that which is so near nothing. If the board would make a law requiring every teacher to insist upon the use of a perfect English in all the recitations of his pu pils, and a perfect enunciation of every word, they would be upon the right track for securing a good