of the body and face would be the first thing we should resort to to make ourselves understood. The methods of the Chinese, cited by Fowler in his "English Grammar," is an illustration of the expressive power of this silent but powerful language. He says: "The absence of an alphabet has deprived the Chinese of an important means of preserving a uniformity of spoken language through any part of the empire. A native of China would be altogether unintelligible speaking his local patois at a distance of two hundred miles from home; and yet, like Arabic figures in Europe, the written character is every where the same throughout the whole of China, though in reading and speaking the local pronunciation makes, in fact, separate languages. The Chinese prefer their mode of speaking to the mind through the eye, by means of visible signs, as superior to spoken words addressed to the ear. Indeed, so far do they carry their attachment to this mode of communication, that it is not uncommon there to see men conversing rapidly together by tracing characters in the air."

We must agree therefore with the ancients that there is a power in the proper use of gesture that should not be overlooked by the student who expects to shine in the forum, in the pulpit, or on the stage. For the law has not changed; gesture is as necessary now as in the days of Demosthenes. The sight as well as the ear needs instruction. It is said that the man who can speak two languages with ease possesses the power of two men. It is equally true that the person who can with fluency and grace speak the two languages of speech and gesture conveys in what he says the force of two men. Such a one truly in earnest is a host in himself, and speaks with an authority that carries its own conviction. Not so the untaught, uncertain speaker: doubtfulness impedes his utterance; his weak, unexpressive movements distress us, and awkward and untimely thrusts disgust us.

We admire the orator who stands up in full possession of himself and his subject. He will require no such accessories as pulling at his watch-chain to keep himself busy, or of resting his hands in his pockets to hold himself up, or to fumble a paper to employ his fingers, or take off and put on his spectacles every few minutes to see his own ideas. Nor do we like to see the speaker who is unable to stand alone, and supports his elbows on a desk; nor one who tosses his body up and down as though it were a spiral spring, elevated by the lightness and depressed by the weight of his ideas. Neither do we fancy the rocking to and fro from heel to toe, nor the standing like a wax figure with both pedestals like perpendicular parallel lines, with arms to match.

Nor is it pleasant to see the arms work with an angular jerk or straight up and down movement, or flying off in such spasmodic efforts as suggest internal wires and cog-wheels worked by crank. Nor should a speaker come to the rostrum displaying his manner of cleaning his nose; in appearance saying to his audience, "I am getting ready as fast as possible;" then crowd his handkerchief back into his pocket in a business-like way, jerk his coat into place with his shoulders, which says, "At last I am ready." All these are significant gestures, but not relevant to the occasion nor respectful to the audience.

What then is gesture? It is the pathognomy of the passions, sentiments, and thoughts, or their mode of expressing themselves by pantomimic movements of the body, limbs, and face. This is its office, which suggests all natural movements, and these can only be effective by perfectly expressing the passion or sentiment of which they are to be the translators. There must be no "outdoing Termagant;" but "suit the action to the word, the word to the action." Every emotion has its own natural symbol.

If we wish to make gesture the graceful and dignified assistant to declamation and acting, instead of a system of forced movements and unexpressive motions or painful bodily contortions, we must become close and critical observers of the mute manifestations of different states and conditions of mind, and imitate them. Study persons when under the excitement of combative and destructive passions; see the clenched hand, the forcible, straight-line movements of the arms, the defensive, defiant position of the body, and the firm bracing of the feet; and the opposite manifestations of fear-the relaxed and shrinking body, with hands thrown up, palms outward, and the fingers separated and bent as if to ward off the danger. Closely akin to these are the signs of horror, with the wild look of the eye. Again, observe the uplifted hands of devotion and reverence, pointing the upward tendencies of those faculties; and the broader and more flowing movements of the arms under the excited imagination of the general poetical sentiments; the outstretched hand and downward palm of the benediction; in love, the soft serenity of countenance, the languishing eyes and sweetness of voice; the bright expectant look of hope; the poised and winged appearance of flight; the joyful clasping of the hands in realized desire; and the frowning brow and furtive and uneasy glances of hatred and revenge.

These signs, given under the influence and excitement of the passions, are infallible indicators of the uses of gesture, and open to us fully their importance in making declamation expressive and effective:

and every one who intends to become an orator or an actor should keep his eyes open to this the language of nature.

It may be argued that gesture should be spontaneous, and so it should. It should be that spontaneity that comes from limbs and muscles that have long been trained in obedience to ease and grace. The speaker's tones of voice should not be uppermost in his mind during the delivery of his oration; but these must be obedient from previous training to express every shade of thought which the subject and occasion require. : must not be supposed that these matters relate to declamation only; they should be studied with the idea that the more perfectly we express ourselves the better instructors we become, and the greater our influence in the world. A life of noble purposes, ably and artistically given to the world, is a blessing to mankind. We glorify our Maker by the best use of the faculties he has given us for the elevation of ourselves and others. It is not the simple shouting of his name which glorifies it. We should express the beauty, variety, and greatness of his endowments by purest purposes and noblest efforts.

SONG OF THE SHIRT.

With fingers weary and worn,
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags,
Plying her needle and thread.
Stitch! stitch! stitch!

In poverty, hunger, and dirt,
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch
She sang the "Song of the Shirt!"

"Work-work-work

While the cock is crowing aloof!

And work-work-work

Till the stars shine through the roof!

It's oh! to be a slave

Along with the barbarous Turk,
Where woman has never a soul to save,
If this is Christian work.

Work-work-work

Till the brain begins to swim;
Work-work-work

Till the eyes are heavy and dim!
Seam and gusset and band,

Band and gusset and seam,

Till over the buttons I fall asleep

And sew them on in a dream!

Work-work-work!

My labor never flags;

And what are its wages? A bed of straw,
A crust of bread-and rags;

This shattered roof, and this naked floor

A table-a broken chair

And a wall so blank, my shadow I thank
For sometimes falling there!
Work-work-work

From weary chime to chime;
Work-work-work,

As prisoners work for crime! Band and gusset and seam,

Seam and gusset and band,

Till the heart is sick, and the brain benumbed, As well as the weary hand.

Work-work-work

In the dull December light,

And work-work-work

When the weather is warm and bright;

While underneath the eaves

The brooding swallows cling,

As if to show me their sunny backs,

And twit me with the spring.

Oh! but to breathe the breath

Of the cowslip and primrose sweetWith the sky above my head,

And the grass beneath my feet! For only one short hour

To feel as I used to feel,

Before I knew the woes of want
And the walk that costs a meal!

Oh! but for one short hour-
A respite, however brief!
No blessed leisure for love or hope,
But only time for grief!

A little weeping would ease my heart,
But in their briny bed

My tears must stop, for every drop
Hinders needle and thread!

O men with sisters dear!

O men with mothers and wives! It is not linen you're wearing out, But human creatures' lives! Stitch-stitch-stich,

In poverty, hunger, and dirt, Sewing at once with a double thread

A shroud as well as a shirt.

But why do I talk of Death?
That phantom of grisly bone,
I hardly fear his terrible shape,
It seems so like my own-
It seems so like my own
Because of the fasts I keep.

O God! that bread should be so dear,

And flesh and blood so cheap!"

HAMLET'S ADVICE TO THE PLAYERS. SHAKESPEARE.

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue: but if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines. Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand,— thus but use all gently: for in the very torrent,-tempest, and (as I may say) whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness. Oh, it offends me to the soul to see a robustious periwigpated fellow tear a passion to tatters,-to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings; who, for the most part, are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumb shows and noise: I would have such a fellow whipped for o'erdoing Termagant; it out-herods Herod. Pray you, avoid it. Be not too tame neither; but let your own discretion be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the word to the action; with this special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature; for any thing so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first and now, was and is to hold, as 't were, the mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time his form and pressure. Now this, overdone or come tardy off, though it make the unskillful laugh, can not but make the judicious grieve; the censure of the which one must, in your allowance, o'erweigh a whole theater of others. Oh, there be players that I have seen play-and heard others praise, and that highly-not to speak it profanely, that, neither having the accent of Christians, nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.

MOONBEAMS.

Sitting in the dusky light,

Watching shadows of the night
Darkly fall o'er distant hill

While the world is calm and still,

Moonbeams come with fairy gleams,
Filling all my heart with dreams,

Lighting up the days by-gone,

Hallowing all the years to come.

Shimmering through the leaves so bright,
Dancing on the casement white,

Falling golden on the floor,

Beams of radiance round me pour;