Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1922-03-03
As one WOMAN SEES It
Little oIrls At Singing Lessons Must
: Now Consider That Some Day
They May De Public Speak.
ere and should Learn to
Breathe Correctly
BY SARAH d. LowRrE ,


who failed, however, in part OF her erect
because she did not breathe correctly. Her
shortness Of breath had made her sentences
and, indeed, her manner less well rounded
than she meant them to be.
And" said the singing teacher, pointing
the moral to this particular tale, 'as you
are all Of you likely to have to. be public
speakers OF one sort or another, or Tor one
cause or another, you can understand Why !
make so much Of your breathing exercises
The mites on the primary benches nodded
IN grave acquiescence to this dictum; and
tion as to relatives in the female sex who
were good speakers, and even great speak
ers, IL enthusiasm and frequency could be
counted as factors in greatness There was
no hesitation certainly on the part OF any
of the infants about their own future careers
on the stump and platform.
8 ONE by one these barriers of former
"A prejudice and timid self consciousness
20 down before the weight Of mere usage,
find myself astonished and gleeful on the
side lines. If 1, still in my prime, have seen
SO: much bigotry and habit scrappcd. what
will not tho next quarter of a century bring
me! ! begin to understand st. Pauls great
sweeping representation
And the last enemy that shall be de.
stroyed is Death!''
IF 1T Is only from the viewpoints Of
L woman's public appearances now and in
my mothers youngish womanhood there Is
a greater change than in oil the preceding
centuries put together.
They are learning very fast lately. too,
the value of being able to speak extern
poraneously, or Mt least from SO brief an
outline Of notes that they have the appear.
ance Of perfect ease and freedom.
It is OF an immense advantage, OF course,
to feel your audience as you speak and to
adapt yourself to the subtle audience mood
Of the moment. 1t is almost fatal to try to
do BOTH. e., read from manuscript and
break of into direct address. The two styles
are quite unlike and do not become each
other. If you read you have got to use more
effort to concentrate your audience, while
II you speak without written notes, beyond
effort to concentrate your own mind. But
of the two ways the spontaneous way OF
addressing a crowd is far the more effective
and gives chance for sudden plays Of wit
and pathos or irony and Indignation that
would be suicidal from written manu-
script.
The modern manner pretty much scraps
quotations and discards what might be
called "palaver." 1t uses asides and in
dulges in personalities; it is slightly bio
graphical and has the air Of taking one into
it's confidence rather darinsly. The modern
mothers circle, but she would also manage
to say in ten words what they took
laborious ten pages to disclose. And II she
has more frank egotism in stating her opin-
IONS sne would perish at the Ia STAKE latner
'""n ''u"u '''''"'' VI -ne'''' ~"'"0'
,., A..
WAS very much struck WIN tnat at the
L Modern Club the other morning when the
two women whom that very well named or
ganization had invited to debate upon the
victorian Versus the Modern Girl made
their points for and against.
BY some clever and purposeful "hocus
pocus' the woman who should have spoken
ern. and the one" who is n modern Of the
moderns from the cut of her gown to the
twist Of her mind should have lifted
lance for a generation that would have had
none of her.
principal Of young ladies' boarding school
and fond disciple Of Robert Browning and
a noted guide of youth in the way 1t should
go-for nothing. She was a notably cul-
tured exponent Of the late Victorian poets
Browning's poems with her kind regards in
1t which she gave to my mother with Rabbi
Ben Ezra heavily marked some time back in
the Dos. She quotes heavily and sweetly
and in defending the sweet, true, Infinitely
onJsf ~ ;t ~, tbe Rnsk,nian moral baloncs tSat
G,"a, V;c+ori. moIa sn fo oshionahja md tho
SJan SuJJem 49,, hos ,maSo co Intod anu 'n'
inoue'" s''' nus '''"Ne so
=,
nN The other manu. the prejudice, the
~ sharp candor, the careless impudence,
the witty egotism of Mrs. James Starr (nee
Wister) in defending tho Victorian was
tolerated in 1860.
Having no notes-except in her clever