In reading the little poem from The Princess, (page 107) note how we are influenced by the tense emotion of the attendants who speak. We do not try to imitate them; but having made the scene stand out before us, we speak as we in imagination hear them, in an aspirated tone of voice:

In the last line it would savour of melodrama to try to impersonate the lady as she says:

The important point is to show intelligent sympathy with her speech, not to imitate her manner of uttering it.

On the other hand we must not make the mistake of supposing that if we get the thought and the emotion, the true vocal expression will follow. One who has a fine appreciation of a piece of literature may, notwithstanding, read it very indifferently. Even in conversation where we are interpreting vocally our own thoughts and feelings, we sometimes misplace emphasis or employ the wrong inflection. How much more likely we are to fall into such errors when we attempt to interpret vocally from a book the thoughts of another.

In order to criticise ourselves or understand intelligent criticism, we must have a knowledge of the laws that govern speech—that is, we must know what properties of tone or what acts of the voice correspond to certain mental and emotional states. For example, the amount and character of thinking done while we read determines the rate of utterance; the purpose or motive of the thought and its completeness or incompleteness are indicated by an upward or downward slide of the voice; the nervous tension expresses itself in a certain key; the physical and mental energy, in a certain power or volume of the voice; and the character of the emotion is reflected in the quality. These principles of vocal expression are known technically as the elements of time, inflection, pitch, force, and quality. Closely connected with these elements are pause, grouping, stress, emphasis, shading, and perspective.

Pause. It must be quite clear that when we are reading silently, for the purpose of getting the thought for ourselves, our minds are at work as has been described. We shall now examine how this work done by the mind affects the voice and produces what we call good expression when we are reading aloud for the purpose of conveying thought to others. As an illustration we shall take an example from The Glove and the Lions:

In these lines there are certain words or phrases which stand out prominently, since they call up mental pictures, namely: "nobles," "benches round," "Count de Lorge," and "one." In order to give time to make these mental pictures, we naturally pause after each one. At the end of the first line we combine the details, making a larger mental image, with the result that we make a long pause after "side." In reading the second line, the eye and the mind run ahead of the voice, and the reader, wishing to impress the listener with the new and important idea "Count de Lorge," pauses before it as well as after it. In the same way he pauses before the phrase, "he hoped to make his bride," to prepare the mind of the listener to receive the impression. Thus we see that, if the mind is working, a pause occurs after a word while we are making a mental image or trying to realize the idea more fully, and also often before we express an important idea, in order to prepare the mind of the listener for what is to come.

A very useful exercise in the study of pause is to image the pictures in selections such as the following:

Then, too, in passing from one idea or thought to another, the mind requires time to make the transition:

Here the mind passes in succession from the action of Lartius to that of Herminius and that of Horatius. A long pause is required after "beneath," "teeth," and "dust," with a shorter pause after "Seius" and after "thrust." Further, if the thoughts concern actions far apart, more time is required to make the transition, and hence a longer pause: