Читать книгу Vocal Expression: A Class-book of Voice Training and Interpretation - Katherine Jewell Everts - Страница 11

There was once a noble ship full of eager passengers, straining at full speed from England to America. Two-thirds of a prosperous voyage thus far were over, and in our mess we were beginning to talk of home.

Suddenly a dense fog came, shrouding the horizon, but, as this was a common occurrence in the latitude we were sailing, it was hardly mentioned in our talk. A happier company never sailed upon an autumn sea. When a quick cry from the lookout, a rush of officers and men, and we were grinding on a ledge of rocks off Cape Race. I heard the cry, "Every one on deck!" and knew what that meant—the masts were in danger of falling. A hundred pallid faces were huddled together near the stern of the ship where we were told to go and wait.

Suddenly we heard a voice up in the fog in the direction of the wheel-house ringing like a clarion above the roar of the waves. As the orders came distinctly and deliberately through the captain's trumpet to "Shift the cargo," to "Back her," to "Keep her steady," we felt, somehow, that the commander up there in the thick mist knew what he was about.

When, after weary days of anxious suspense, the vessel leaking badly, we arrived safely in Halifax, old Mr. Cunard, agent of the line, on hearing from the mail officer that the steamer had struck on the rocks and been saved by the captain's presence of mind and courage, replied, simply: "Just what I might have expected. Captain Harrison is always master of the situation."

No man ever became master of the situation by accident or indolence. "He happened to succeed" is a foolish, unmeaning phrase. No man happens to succeed. "What do you mix your paints with?" asked a visitor of Opie, the painter. "With brains, sir," was the artist's reply. ***

There are men who fail of mastery in the world from too low an estimate of human nature. "Despise nothing, my son," was the advice a mother gave to her boy when he went forth into the untried world to seek his fortune, and that boy grew up into Sir Walter Scott. ***

In case of great emergency it took a certain general in our army several days to get his personal baggage ready. Sheridan rode into Winchester without even a change of stockings in his saddle-bags. ***

All great leaders have been inspired with a great belief. In nine cases out of ten, failure is borne of unbelief.—Masters of the Situation, James T. Fields.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;

Or close the wall up with our English dead!

In peace, there's nothing so becomes a man

As modest stillness and humility;

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

Then imitate the action of the tiger:

Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,

Disguise fair nature with hard-favoured rage: ***

Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit

To his full height! On, on, you noblest English,

Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof!

Fathers that, like so many Alexanders,

Have in these parts from morn till even fought,

And sheathed their swords for lack of argument. ***

I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,

Straining upon the start. The game's afoot:

Follow your spirit; and, upon this charge

Cry—God for Harry! England! and St. George!

—Henry V., Shakespeare

Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate—we cannot consecrate—we cannot hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here have consecrated it, far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.—Address at Gettysburg, Abraham Lincoln.

From an address delivered in the Auditorium, at Chicago, on the afternoon of February 22, 1902, on the occasion of the celebration of Washington's Birthday.