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peel,

meal,

feel,

pä,

fä,

mä,

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deal-pile,

mile, file,

day. tile.

dä -pooh, boo, moo, dō.

The Fourth Step is Reading. Selections involving the sentiments of serenity, beauty, and love, are best suited for exercises in vocal purity. The effusive form of utterance, and the long vowel quantities required for the proper expression of these sentiments, will enable the student to detect harshness or impurity in the tones of his voice.

Singing or chanting exercises may be introduced here, but it is better to use only a few exercises, inasmuch as the same vocal principle enunciated in the second step will be repeated with slight variations in all these exercises. As soon as the pupil is aware of the impurity of the tones he is using, and has a clear notion of how to improve the quality of his voice in the use of a few wellchosen exercises, he should be put to the reading of selections. The stimulus of thought and sentiment, and the awakened powers of appreciation, will encourage him in his work, and at the same time furnish as good opportunities for vocal practice as the abstract exercises.

EXAMPLES FOR PRACTICE.

SONG.

When stars are in the quiet skies,
Then most I pine for thee;
Bend on me then, thy tender eyes,

As stars look on the sea.

For thoughts, like waves that glide by night,
Are stillest when they shine;

Mine earthly love lies hushed in light

Beneath the heaven of thine.

There is an hour when angels keep
Familiar watch o'er men,

When coarser souls are wrapt in sleep-
Sweet spirit, meet me then.
There is an hour when holy dreams

Through slumber fairest glide,

And in that mystic hour it seems

Thou shouldst be by my side.

The thoughts of thee too sacred are
For daylight's common beam;
I can but know thee as my star,
My angel, and my dream!

When stars are in the silent skies,

Then most I pine for thee;

Bend on me, then, thy tender eyes,

As stars look on the sea.

Sir Edward Lytton.

Frequently test the purity of the tone you are using by prolonging the vowel quantity in certain words, and then use the same pure quality in shortened form for reading—thus, in the first line of the song the words stars and skies whose vowels are long, may be so used; also in the second line the words pine and thee, etc.

DRIFTING.

My soul to-day

Is far away,
Sailing the Vesuvian Bay;

My winged boat,

A bird afloat,

Swims round the purple peaks remote:

Round purple peaks

It sails and seeks

Blue inlets, and their crystal creeks,

Where high rocks throw,

Through deeps below,

A duplicated golden glow.

Far, vague and dim,

The mountains swim:
While on Vesuvius' misty brim,
With outstretched hands,
The gray smoke stands,
O'erlooking the volcanic lands.

Here Ischia smiles
O'er liquid miles;

And yonder, bluest of the isles,

Calm Capri waits,

Her sapphire gates

Beguiling to her bright estates.

I heed not if

My rippling skiff

Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff;With dreamful eyes

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Under the walls

Where swells and falls

The Bay's deep breast at intervals,
At peace I lie,

Blown softly by,

A cloud upon this liquid sky.

The day, so mild,

Is Heaven's own child,

With Earth and Ocean reconciled;-
The airs I feel

Around me steal

Are murmuring to the murmuring keel.

Over the rail

My hand I trail

Within the shadow of the sail,

A joy intense,

The cooling sense,

Glides down my drowsy indolence.

With dreamful eyes

My spirit lies

Where Summer sings and never dies,— O'erveiled with vines,

She glows and shines

Among her future oil and wines.

Her children hid

The cliffs amid,

Are gamboling with the gamboling kid;

Or down the walls,

With tipsy calls,

Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls.

The fisher's child,

With tresses wild,

Unto the smooth, bright sand beguiled,

With glowing lips

Sings as she skips,

Or gazes at the far-off ships.

Yon deep bark goes

Where traffic blows,

From lands of sun to lands of snows;-
This happier one,

Its course is run

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PASSING AWAY.

Was it the chime of a tiny bell

That came so sweet to my dreaming ear,

Like the silvery tones of a fairy's shell,

That he winds on the beach so mellow and clear,
When the winds and the waves lie together asleep,
And the moon and the fairy are watching the deep,
She dispensing her silvery light,
And he his notes as silvery quite,

While the boatman listens and ships his oar,
To catch the music that comes from the shore?—
Hark! the notes on my ear that play,
Are set to words: as they float, they say,
"Passing away! passing away!"

But, no; it was not a fairy's shell,

Blown on the beach, so mellow and clear:
Nor was it the tongue of a silver bell

Striking the hours that fell on my ear,
As I lay in my dream: yet was it a chime
That told of the flow of the stream of Time;
For a beautiful clock from the ceiling hung,
And a plump little girl for a pendulum, swung;

(As you've sometimes seen, in a little ring
That hangs in his cage, a canary bird swing;)
And she held to her bosom a budding bouquet,
And as she enjoyed it, she seemed to say,
"Passing away! passing away!"

Oh, how bright were the wheels, that told
Of the lapse of time as they moved round slow!
And the hands, as they swept o'er the dial of gold,
Seemed to point to the girl below.

And lo! she had changed;-in a few short hours,
Her bouquet had become a garland of flowers,
That she held in her outstretched hands, and flung
This way and that, as she, dancing, swung
In the fullness of grace and womanly pride,
That told me she soon was to be a bride;

Yet then, when expecting her happiest day,
In the same sweet voice I heard her say,
"Passing away! passing away!"

While I gazed on that fair one's cheek, a shade
Of thought, or care, stole softly over,
Like that by a cloud in a summer's day made,
Looking down on a field of blossoming clover.

The rose yet lay on her cheek, but its flush

Had something lost of its brilliant blush;

And the light in her eye, and the light on the wheels, That marched so calmly round above her,

Was a little dimmed-as when evening steals

Upon noon's hot face:—yet one could n't but love her;
For she looked like a mother whose first babe lay
Rocked on her breast, as she swung all day;
And she seemed in the same silver tone to say,
"Passing away! passing away!"

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