OUR LADY CONTRIBUTORS.

Observer, Volume 4, Issue 91, 10 June 1882, Page 201

OUR LADY CONTRIBUTORS.

VOICE

Ag-aix find again have colonial girls had to endure reproach as regards their tone of voice and mode of speech. Those -who have had opportunities of contrasting the difference of manner between home and colonial girls can best judge how far the criticism may be just. From my own limited experience I should say that it is, so far as modulation of tone goes. I was in one of the leading draper's shops the other day, when' a daughter of one of our most " respected citizens " entered and began to look at some gloves. Although a whisper would have been audible to the attendant, the lady's voice was pitched in such a high, staccato key that every word was heard at the other end of the shop. Yet I have heard the same girl in a draw-ing-room practise that excellent thing in woman — a low voice. It is a trick some girls have of speaking to inferiors in a high rapid tone. Perhaps it comes of a sense of unassured position, or a mistaken notion of command. A certain aristocratic writer says that " birth may be judged by voice." It is certain that no amount of " roughing it " will take the tone of culture out of a man's voice, when it is already a cultured one. I say a man's voice, advisedly, for I have known women's voices to alter for the worse in the space of a year, through being associated with flippant companions. I suppose it is due to their unconscious facility for imitation. I was passing through one of our vilely cut-tip streets the other day when one of the men, working in a trench, in the middle of the road, made some remark to his mate. I turned and glanced at the speaker, but there was nothing in his appearance to denote the right to a higher sphere than that of ditch-digging. However, the tone of voice caused me to remark sotto voce, " You are no common man." My surmise has proved correct; the delver has a right to the prefix honourable (not a colonial hon.,) and immoderate use of " fire-water " is the cause of his social fall. Wo speech can he graceful that is not natural. Assumed voices are of the things that are readily detected, be they assumed ever bo wisely. I think that to most refined people the voice is the chief engine of fascination ; it is also a very good index of character, or better perhaps, of "temperament. How often we meet those people with low, softly-modulated voices, who possess well regulated minds and dignified manners. There are some voices, one feels impelled to listen to, and this is one of them. But they are oftener

possessed by men than by. women, young ones at least. I daresay most people have noticed much alike are the voices of -colonial ''girls.- A certain shrill rapidity not unmixed with sweetness. Courteous people usually possess, voices -to match; their inannels. Courtesyj being a badge of the true woman, as well as of the perfect gentleman, is, when accompanied by pleasing tones, more irresistable to the heart than beauty is to the eye. 1 once happened to be dining- at a public table near a gentleman who was relating to his neighbour (as a capital joke) how a newly married friend of his had fallen in love with the lady, now his wife, through hearing her speak, though he could not see her face. To use the speaker's own. words, <v She had a voice of such caressing softness, that lie was smitten, got introduced ; and afterimpressions confirmed his first idea and he married the girl." — G-rapton.