The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1871-05-03

OF antlqulty, partlcularly III tno matter VI
stump oratory. If the ancient Roman ad-
dressed the plebs, we figure to ourselves
| man of stately gesture and irreproachable
latinity. who by no means could be guilty of
such an idiom as "you know how it Is your
SELF" When G. M. Coriolanus, Esq, took the
stump for the consulship no one would dream
of putting into his mouth a homely anecdote,
beginning with ''that reminds me Of story"
Are we TO suppose that there were no Old Abes
in those daysP Shakespeare, indeed, helps US
on the matter, showing that these things did
exist, for he makes Caius solloquize, while
waiting for the "b'hoys": -"Since the wisdom
Of their choice Is rather to have my hat than
my heart, will practise the insnuating nod,
and be of to them most counterfeitly.' Boa
dicea is pictured to US In foreground Of
scythe-wheeled chariots, with host of shaggy
Britons in the background. Does history
mean to inform us that she made no such re-
mark as "Ho the roast beef of Hold Hing
land?" and that her thin-clad army replied in
no such soul-inspiring chorus as -
Um lokes drop O. good beer, UNI does;
And darn their eyes II ever they tries
To rob poor man Of his beer
This last would refer to the Romans. All
this is promised with the view Of calling at
tention to foreign danger which threatens
one of our great American institutions-s'tb
stump"-as it at present exists. Delsarte is
the danger; let stump rhetoricians everywhere
look to it.
The people Of America, like those of Rome
in Its great but still its growing days, are very
susceptible to the mstheticism of foreign
nations. Rome, in its hardy, struggling youth,
was semi-barbarian or three-quarter polished,
| just as it pleased. So in the first few decades
of our nationality were we as people. Now,
however, the Old World commences to shame
us with sense of our backwardness
| in many things, and hence our readi-
ness to seize greedily on everything from
| abroad that savors Of the beautiful.
| The great system of dramatic expression per-
| fected by NJ. Delsarte is the latest aesthetic
novelty that threatens us. A young gentle
man, disciple of Delsarte, has given lee
| ture or two In America, and straightway the
| subterranean rumblings of an aesthetic earth
quake give warning Of what is to come. AS
| the public are aware, the new system aims at
bringing the gestures and movements Of ora
When we consider the hundreds Of thousands
of able-bodied citizens whom this earthquake
will overturn the mind shrinks back appalled,.
We have our rights and should protect
them. In the oratorical line these are
to say what we please, how we please. When,
therefore, an innovating foreigner comes in to
hamper us with sumptuary laws of eloquence,
the American eagle well may shrek and the
ghost of General Jackson swear 'By the
Eternal y A sense Of utter scorn for this
granulator of grins and formulation Of frowns
will burst between here and shutdown from the
tors on the heads of one million -four barrels,
from the halls of thirty-seven State Lsgisla-
lures, will roll from the bar of justice to the
bar of the liquor store, will reverberate In
! thunder from the very walls of the Capitol,
| and fad at least one echo in the White
House ITSELF Delsarte, we are in
formed, studied all the sciences bearing
on his subject. This is a mistake;
for did he have the faintest idea that his
system would ever reach as far as America,
he should have added one more to the ologies
he mastered. That Is the science Of hitting
straight from the shoulder, which we may call
histology. This defect will at once ''strike"
| every true stump orator in the land. He has
applied his science to the stage and to the
pulpit How, without q study Of histology,
can he think Of applying it to the .'stump ?"
A Frenchmau has very vague ideas of le 6ore,
it is true, and thus far Delsarte must be ex-
cused.
Yet, if we must improve our method of
public speaking, there is an alternative left.
Mace and Coburn are about to fight for the
fistic championship; let the winner be
called in to adapt the system of
Delsarte to the American constitution. In the
happiness which this would bring to forty
millions of freemen we can let our fancy stray
awhile into the future when the ''esthetic
| gymnastics" of the two great professors of
pugiism and polished utterance have impaired
their science and art to the Stars and Stripes.
| There will be difficulties In the way, but a
growing love of the beautiful will remove them.
1t will, indeed, be hard to induce the old turnip
philosopher to keep his boots inside his pants
and the ''serpent exercise" of the arms will
necessarily lose much of their grace in the
sleeves Of his white coat. He will then proba-
bly, let US hear "what know about dramatic
expression" and give, as illustration, his great
speech, "You lie, you villain you le!" with
all the Homeric dignity Of that other ancient
bore, Nestor. Ben Butler will be hard case
to manage, particularly in the training Of those
odd eyes of his, while it will take him long
time to give at will glance of Glove border
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