is to stand still. The judicious employment of moderate gesture is more effective than any possible amplification of spasmodic attitudes, or redundancy of grimace.

No one can recite with propriety what he does not feel; and the key to gesture, as well as to modulation, is earnestness. No actor can portray character unless he can realize it, and he can only realize it by making it for the time his own.

In the natural order of passionate expression, looks are first, gesture second, and words last. Inexpressive motions should always be avoided. No gesture should be made without a reason for it; and when any position has been assumed, there should be no change from it without a reason. The habit of allowing the hands to fall to the side immediately after every gesture, produces an ungracefully restless effect. The speaker seems

“Awkward, embarrassed, stiff, without the skill

Of moving gracefully, or standing still -
Blessed with all other requisites to please,
He wants the striking elegance of ease."

Some orators accompany every vocal accent by a bodily motion; but the consequence is, that their monotonous manipulations fatigue the eye. A gesture that illustrates nothing is worse than useless. It destroys the effect of really appropriate movements. Perhaps

the most difficult part of delivery is gracefully to stand still. Let the speaker study this.

Motions towards the body indicate self-esteem, egotism, or invitation; from the body, command or repulsion; expanding gestures express liberality, distribution, acquiescence, or candor; contracting gestures, frugality, reserve, or collection; rising motions express suspension, climax, or appeal; falling, completion, declaration, or response; a sudden stop in gesture expresses doubt, meditation, or listening; a sudden movement, decision or discovery; a broad and sweeping range of gesture illustrates a general statement, or expresses boldness, freedom, and self-possession; a limited range denotes diffidence or constraint, or illustrates a subordinate point; rigidity of muscle denotes firmness, strength, or effort: laxity, languor or weakness; slow motions are expressive of gentleness, caution, and deliberation; and quick motions, of harshness and temerity.

The motions of the arm must commence at the shoulder, not at the elbow; the upper part of the arms should never, therefore, rest in

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contact with the side. The motions of the arms should not be accompanied by any action of the shoulders, or swaying of the body. For instance, in projecting forward one arm, the opposite shoulder must not retire; or, in raising one arm, the opposite shoulder must not be depressed. The body must be kept square to the eye of the auditor, or to the center of the auditors. Gesture is most graceful with the right hand and arm when the left foot is in advance, and with the left when the right foot is in front. This preserves the square of the body.

Gesture, like vocal expression, must depend on the force and earnestness of the speaker's conception of what he utters. Rules and diagrams are of little service here. But an attempt has been made, by some ingenious writers, to classify the leading positions; and the accompanying diagrams (copied from photographs of living youths) will be found to illustrate these. They may serve as hints to the unpracticed.

The leading positions may be styled, -1. The introductory. 2. Deprecatory. 3. Emphatic. 4. Invocatory. 5. The positions of Entreaty and Denial. 6. Relative. 7. The positions of Repose. A speaker, in opening his subject to his audience, may, if his language be not abrupt and impassioned at the outset, assume, in his first gesture, the position represented in diagram 1. Here the whole weight of the body should be thrown upon the right leg, which should be a little in advance of the left, the other just touching the floor, the feet being separated about six or eight inches. The knees should be straight and braced; and the body, though perfectly straight, not perpendicular, but inclining as far to the right as a firm position on the right leg will permit. The right arm must

then be extended, with the palm of the hand open, the fingers slightly curved, and the thumb almost as distant from them as it will easily

go, and the flat of the hand neither horizontal nor vertical, but exactly between both, the left hand hanging gracefully by the side. The extended arm should drop apparently lifeless, but not too abruptly, when the last emphatic word is pronounced.

The

When the pupil has delivered a sentence or two of moderate length in this attitude, he may, at the moment of paragraphing his subject to the eye, reverse his position; doing, perhaps, with the left arm, hand, and leg, what he has just done with the right. But a perpetual see-saw of the arms is to be studiously avoided, as also a formal monotony in the change from one side to the other. Every movement must have its object. An attempt to distribute gestures equally between the right and left arm betrays the novice right arm is the more naturally and frequently used in gesticulating. The weight of the body should generally be sustained entirely by one foot. The limb that does not support the weight should be slightly bent, and its foot should rest lightly, or only partially, on the ground. The feet should be generally separated about as much as the breadth of the foot- the one in advance of the other, with its heel pointing to the heel of the retired foot. More extended positions will be occasionally required in expressive action. The feet considerably separated, with the weight of the body on the advanced foot, indicate eagerness, earnest appeal, listening, attack, &c.; on the retired foot, disgust, horror, defense, &c.; considerably apart, with both heels on the same line, and the weight of the body supported equally on both feet, pomposity and bluster. Frequent change indicates mental disturbance.

Diagram 2.- All the parts of the body must blend in harmonious accompaniment with the gesticulating member. Isolated motions must be ungraceful, as they are unnatural. The impulse that moves the hand will not be unfelt by every muscle in the frame.

"To this one standard make your just appeal :

Here lies the golden secret, Learn to feel!"

But, in the words of Shakspeare, "In the very tempest, torrent, and, as I may say, whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness.' A speaker who loses command over himself, either in language, intonation, or gesture, must not be surprised if he preserve no command over his audience.

This diagram (II.) represents a position suitable for the delivery

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of passages where a corrective or deprecatory idea is to be expressed; or of passages moderately emphatic. It would properly accompany such passages as the following:

I will not do them wrong; I'd rather choose
To wrong the dead-to wrong myself or you—
Than I would wrong such honorable men.

SHAKSPEARE.

I have undertaken this prosecution, fathers, not that I might draw envy upon that illustrious order of which the accused happens to be, but with the direct design of clearing your justice and impartiality before the world. -CICERO v. VERRES.

Not that I doubt the honorable gentleman's disposition to do rightfar from it!

Ah! gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake. Such a secret can be safe nowhere.- WEBSTER,

Diagram 3.

This diagram represents positions suitable for the ' delivery of a highly emphatic sentiment. The arm should be gradually raised from the position shown in diagram 1, until the hand is at the level of the head, the palm of the hand being presented flat, or nearly so, towards the audience (diagram 3, a); the arm should

then be brought, suddenly and with decision, to the position shown in diagram 3 (b). Care must be taken that the body is maintained in a straight line with the leg on which it bears, and not suffered to lean to the opposite side. The attitudes represented in this diagram would be suitable for the delivery of passages similar to these:

I'll keep them all;

By heaven! he shall not have a Scot of them;

No, if a Scot would save his soul, he shall not:
I'll keep them by this hand!

SHAKSPEARE.

If we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained, we must fight; I repeat it, sir, we must fight !- HENRY.

If I were an American, as I am an Englishman, - while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I never would lay down my arms— never! never! never!- CHATHAM.

The blood-thirsty prætor, deaf to all he could urge in his own defense, ordered the infamous punishment to be inflicted. - CICERO v. VERRES.

Diagram 4.-The invocatory position should be used when the speaker has to make a vehement appeal to Heaven; or when senti