125. The Lower Pitch is used in sorrow, sadness, dejection, gloom, despair, and similar states. The student should exercise himself on passages demanding these various pitches. Passages for practice will be found in the Appendix (VIII.). 126. The Parenthesis.-The pitch of the voice is lowered in the parenthesis, and the rate (§ 150) accelerated, till the interrupted course of thought is resumed. The inflection of the voice will rise if the parenthesis occurs after a suspension of the thought: 'I cannot too much muse Such shapes, such gesture, and such sound, expressing (Although they want the use of tongue) a kind 'Coming to look on you, thinking you dead, were,) (And dead almost, my liege, to think you The inflection will fall if the parenthesis occurs after the completion of the main thought: 'Nature makes us poor only when we want necessaries (the number thus in want are comparatively few); but custom gives the name of poverty to the want of superfluities.' 'There is your crown; And He that wears the crown immortally (Which my most inward true and duteous spirit Teacheth), this prostrate and exterior bending.' 2 Henry IV. iv. 4. 127. Change of Paragraph.-The mere passing from one paragraph to another requires a slight change of pitch on the opening words. ‘Gentlemen, I have had my day. I can never express my gratitude to you for having set me in a place wherein I could lend the slightest help to great and laudable designs. If I have had my share in any measure giving quiet to private property and private conscience; if by my vote I have aided in securing to families the best possession, peace; if I have joined in reconciling kings to their subjects, and subjects to their prince; if I have assisted to loosen the foreign holdings of the citizen, and taught him to look for his protection to the laws of his country, and for his comfort to the goodwill of his countrymen ;—if I have thus taken my part with the best of men in the best of their actions, I can shut the book ;-I might wish to read a page or two more -but this is enough of my measure. I have not lived in vain. 'And, now, gentlemen, on this serious day, when I come, as it were, to make up my account with you, let me take to myself some degree of honest pride on the nature of the charges that are brought against me." -BURKE. This slight change to a higher or lower pitch is independent of the more marked change consequent upon the speaker's emotion. (See §§ 123-125.) SECTION II. RHYTHM. 128. Rhythm is a result of the undulation of the voice produced by the recurrence of stress with a certain degree of regularity. The details of rhythm are included under the general heads of Force, and 129. Force is the intension and remission of vocal power. As affecting syllables, it is termed Stress; as affecting clauses or sentences, Energy. 130. Stress. It is the force, or stress, laid upon a syllable in order to distinguish it from others, that produces, under certain conditions, either— Accent, Rhythmical Stress, or 131. Accent is the stress, or 'ictus' of the voice laid on one syllable of a word, to distinguish it from others in the same word. Every word in the language, not monosyllabic, has at least one of its syllables thus distinguished. 132. Secondary Accent.-Words usually have but one accent. When, however, a word has more syllables than will admit of easy pronunciation, secondary accents are introduced as a support to the voice. Thus in the word personification, we may have two accents; a strong accent on the fifth syllable, and a weak accent on the second-persónificátion. The stronger accent, which is termed primary, cannot be dispensed with. The weaker accent, which is called secondary, may be retained, or omitted, at pleasure. Again, in the word indivisibility, the primary accent is on the last syllable but two; but most speakers will feel the need of a secondary accent on the first (indivisibility), and it is quite permissible to support the voice by an additional accent on the third (indivisibility). 133. The place of the primary accent is determined by custom; but the modern tendency is to throw the accent back towards the beginning of the word, e.g. ávenue, not (as in the last century) avénue; théatre, not (as it is sometimes vulgarly pronounced) theátre. The student's only sure guide is reference to the dictionary. 134. Poets, however, sometimes deviate from accepted usage, as may be seen by scanning the following lines: 'No rích perfumes refrésh the fruitful field, No fragrant herbs their native incense yield.'-Pope. Perfume, as a noun, should have been accented on the first. 'Thén methought the áir grew dénser, Perfume, as a verb, should have the accent on the second syllable-únseen should, of course, he unséen. While, again, the accent of a bygone age is not always that of the present: 'Of which vertúe engendred is the flour.'-CHAUCER, Prologue. "There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to, Henry VIII. iii. 2. 'Tears in his eyes, distraction in 's aspect.'—Hamlet, ii. 2. 'With grave Aspéct he rose.'-Paradise Lost, bk. ii. 'Mixed with obdúrute pride and steadfast hate.'-Ibid. 'His rigorous course; but since he stands obdúrate.' Merchant of Venice, iv. 1. 'Far from all people's preace, as in exile.' SPENSER, Faerie Queene, I. iii. 3. 'Since his exile she has despis'd me most.' Two Gentlemen of Verona, iii. 2. If old authors are to be read, old accentuation must be retained. 135. Rhythmical Stress is laid upon monosyllables to assist accent in forming the rhythm of a sentence. In uttering a succession of monosyllables, e.g. 'How do you do?' a speaker would not lay an equal stress upon each word, thus: Hów do you do? But only on such words as he deemed most significant: Hów do you dó? Thus pronounced, the sentence, so far as mere stress is concerned, would fall upon the ear with the identical effect of accent in a polysyllabic word, e.g.: Névertheless. But let the following sentence be substituted for the foregoing: Wolves' mouths ope wide. |