CHAPTER II. THE very expression "Clerical Reading" implies the presence of an audience; and this at once suggests, as the first rule for the reader, that he must make himself well heard. The attainment of this end will be the measure of his exertions, so far as the pitch of his voice is concerned. In whatever degree he falls short of it, he will fail in his duty; while to go beyond it is a certain loss of his own labour, and possibly an annoyance to some of his hearers. In applying this general rule to each particular case, respect must be had, first of all, to the size of the building and its acoustic qualities; and then to the number and condition of the persons in it. On the extent to which they fill it, will much depend what body of sound will be required from the reader; especially with a view to overcoming that most troublesome adversary, Echo, in a large and half empty building. And the fact of their being, as a body, refined and educated, or rude and ignorant, will make a great difference in the pitch most desirable for them. The half-word which proverbially suffices for the wise, is of little or no value to the simple, to whose dull comprehension it suggests nothing. The whole word might, it is true, convey no definite meaning to him; but as long as he hears distinctly what is read, he is content to take sound for sense, or, at any rate, is too just to blame another for his own want of knowledge. Thus, though not edified, he is satisfied and where the reader is a clergyman, and the hearer his parishioner, that is not a little. So far there seems but little, if any, exaggeration in the words Mr. Tennyson puts into the mouth of his "Northern Farmer :" though it may be doubted whether any Southerners of the same class would rise to the high standard of his charity, if what they heard in church less resembled the tones of “articulate-speaking men" than the indistinct drone of the cockchafer :— "An' I hallus comed to's choorch afoor moy Sally wur dead, An' eerd un a bummin' away loike a buzzard-clock ower my yeäd; An' I niver knaw'd what a meän'd, but I thowt a 'ad summut to saäy, An' I thought a said what a owt to a said, an' I comed awaäy,” A College Tutor, for whom some of his undergraduate friends used occasionally to read the lessons in his country church, took care always to address to us this previous exhortation, "Give it them loud they like it loud." We often smiled then at the uniformity and earnestness of his advice; but have long been convinced that it was dictated as much by true wisdom as by the loving zeal for which he was celebrated. Indeed nothing is more disagreeable and irritating to the unlearned members of a congregation than to have to strain their ears throughout a long service, and yet catch but little of it after all. And most just ground of complaint have they against the man who, though physically incapable of making himself heard in that particular church (assuming this to be the reason), still continues to officiate in it. The consequence of his doing so is, that those who are uneducated lose nearly all the service, especially the prayers; in the reading of which their Minister generally husbands his strength for the better delivery of the sermon; and that so members of the Church are tempted to go to the Meetinghouse, where they hope to hear better. In village churches, therefore, the reading may well be louder than their mere size might seem to require; and an earnest clergyman may find ample room for his voice, however strong. Amongst the most regular attendants, probably, will be some of the oldest of his poor parishioners, who have learned to value the offices of religion more than they did in their earlier years. And when he sees one of them who has grown deaf from age, with his eye intently fixed on him, and with his hand. doubled round his ear, to concentrate in it every passing undulation of sound, he will have no heart to resist that mute appeal, but will defer till a later period any intention he may perhaps have formed of sparing himself, as he grows older, by the adoption of a lower tone of voice. In our larger town churches the weak-chested reader often has obstacles of a material nature to contend with, beside the mere extent of space within the walls. Galleries, high as well as deep, may have caused the desk, and still more the pulpit, to be elevated somewhat to their level; so that a great effort is required to force the voice down, against the natural law which sends it up; or it will be very imperfectly heard by many who sit in the body of the church. Wherever this is the case, it renders more than usually needful a caution which may in all cases be serviceable. It is, that the reader should hold his head as erect as he can, and speak as little as he can immediately over, and into, the cloth cover, or cushion, on which his book lies, and which will effectually intercept a great portion of the sound, to the corresponding loss of his hearers. Of these voicetraps every clergyman must beware; till a judicious restoration of all such churches leads to the removal of the unsightly structures which create the difficulty here spoken of. Happily, the higher education and more refined taste of town audiences render, in many cases, a lower tone of voice both intelligible and agreeable to them; and in officiating before them the young and strong reader must be cautious of erring on the side of excess, and must remember that "it is excellent To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous This truth was very forcibly impressed on the writer by a sermon he once heard in a church near London, preached by a young and inexperienced deacon. His personal appearance suggested doubts of his making himself heard; but on the contrary, he delivered his sermon, from beginning to end, in so stentorian a voice, that the congregation, accustomed to the soft but clear tones of a very aged Rector, were evidently lost in amazement and their attention was so diverted from the matter of the sermon, that the voice of the preacher was to them "as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal." In short, the whole address was practically "a voice and nothing more." : Equally objectionable with either of these extremes, if not even more so, is the uneven delivery which combines them both, indulged in by some readers, and still more preachers, who, might |