Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1914-12-06

he expressed his hope that the many for
eigners who might come over to visit
the exhibition concentrating the first
voyage of Columbus would not repeat the
mistake of Columbus himself and stop at
the first island they came to, in the belief
that they had discovered America. That
was hit, a most palpable hit; and the
dwellers on Manhattan island rejoiced at
it, though the keen blade pierced their own
bodies.
These New Workers recognized before the
Chicago speaker had uttered his first half
dozen sentences that they were listening to
a man who had something to say and had
taken pains to prepare it for their pleasure
They saw at once that he was not selfish or
careless or ignorant, and they sat silent to
appreciate the accomplished artist in words.
They knew what so many would-be speakers
ignore or are ignorant of,-that true ease
in speaking comes of art, not chance" The
manner of the speaker was simple, as of one
gentleman talking to another, and the tone
was colloquial. This is the very perfection
OF the postprandial address,-that it shall
have the flavor of talk, of very good talk.
There is no more misleading term than
latter dinner oratory,' because oratory is
absolutely out of place after dinner. When
we are engaged in the agreeable task of
digestion we are in no mood for stately
periods and for majestic peroratlons. We
want to be entertained, even if we are also
instructed.
TT is because he is so acutely conscious that
his listeners desire to be entertained that
nanv a man has recOncied himself to play
ing the clown for their untEinking and half
scornful laughter. The speaker who has
nothing to say, who does not want to say
ANYTHING, who is content to turn himself into
a gesticulating textbook and to exhibit him
elf as biped collection of more or less
comic stories,-the speaker who descends
10 this low level is very prevalent of late, far
90 prevalent. He exhibits himself as an
.mateur rival of the professional monologue
artists of vaudeville. He is offering himself
mp as competitor of the end man OF negro
linstre show. That mature American is
fortunate who has not sat through dinner
after dinner at which more than half the so
called speeches were empty of everything
except anecdotes, told each for its own sake,
and wholly without pertinence to the topic
upon which the speaker was supposed to be
speaking.
THE absurdity of the after-dinner speech
that is nothing more than a string of
alleged humorous stories was keenly per-
ceived by Mark Twain, and by him it was
once merciessly exposed in an afterdinner
idress of his own one of his most amusing
speeches, but unfortunately not reported at
the time, and therefore not included in the
volume wherein many of his other addresses
are garnered.
About twenty years ago there was short
lived club in New York called the Fellow
craft, composed chiefly of magazine writers
and of magazine illustrators. 1t used to
give occasional dinners, with the customary
speeches. At the suggestion of its president,
the late Richard Watson Glider, the Eel
lowcraft Club invited to a special dinner the
half-dozen most popular after-dinner speak
ers of New York, SO that these guests might
be inspired by one anothers presence and
each of them surpass himself in generous
rivalry with the others. But, rather I'M
fortunately for the rest of them, the presi-
de,t of the club called upon Mark Twain
to open the evening. OF course at this long
interval | cannot pretend to reproduce his
exact phrases; but | think | can give the
substance of his remarks with sufficient &C
curacy.
"You have taken me unawares,' he began.
al did not know that you were going to call
upon me to make speech this evening, and
YOU find me wholly unprepared." After the
laughter aroused by this assertion Mark