Mrs. Jameson, the Shakespearean commentator, has given us a penetrating example

of the effect of inflection; "In her impersonation of the part of Lady Macbeth,

Mrs. Siddons adopted successively three different intonations in giving the

words 'We fail.' At first a quick contemptuous interrogation--'We fail?'

Afterwards, with the note of admiration--'We fail,' an accent of indignant

astonishment laying the principal emphasis on the word 'we'--'_we_ fail.'

Lastly, she fixed on what I am convinced is the true reading--_We fail_--with

the simple period, modulating the voice to a deep, low, resolute tone which

settles the issue at once as though she had said: 'If we fail, why then we fail,

and all is over.'"

 

This most expressive element of our speech is the last to be mastered in

attaining to naturalness in speaking a foreign language, and its correct use is

the main element in a natural, flexible utterance of our native tongue. Without

varied inflections speech becomes wooden and monotonous.

 

There are but two kinds of inflection, the rising and the falling, yet these two

may be so shaded or so combined that they are capable of producing as many

varieties of modulation as maybe illustrated by either one or two lines,

straight or curved, thus:

 

[Illustration of each line]

 

Sharp rising