herself always works with the least possible expenditure of
energy and with power in reserve. These must be the voice-user's
principles, to be deliberately and persistently applied. To fill the
chest to the fullest on all occasions is to use up energy to no
purpose and to induce fatigue. Art is ever economical. Effort, obvious
effort, detracts from the listener's enjoyment. Ease in the executant
corresponds with enjoyment in the listener, or, at all events, if
nothing more, it puts him in such a frame of mind, that the more
positive qualities of the performance find him in an undisturbed,
receptive state.

The singer or speaker must breathe easily and adequately, but not so
as to waste his energies. Prior to the execution of his task, he
should consider what respiratory efficiency calls for in the case of
any particular phrase, and meet this without waste--_i.e._, fully, but
with something to spare. For the best art, as well as the soundest
technique, there should always be in the executant enough and to
spare. Let the last word be so uttered or sung that the listener may
feel, however vigorous the passage, that more could have been done had
it been required; in other words, _speak or sing the last word feeling
that several others might follow did one so choose_.

When this principle of reserve force is not observed, the voice-user
may distress himself or his audience in a variety of ways, among
others by a bad habit known as "pumping"--_i.e._, endeavoring to
produce sound when the breath power is really spent. It is only
necessary to refer to it for a moment that its unwisdom and
physiological unrighteousness may be apparent.

Another term, _coup de glotte_ (blow or shock of the glottis), has led
to so much confusion and misunderstanding, which unfortunately, has
been followed by erroneous practice, that it would be well if its
further employment were abandoned.

Breathing, so far as voice-production is concerned, is for the sole
purpose of causing the vocal bands to vibrate; and at this stage we
may say that the perfection of any vocal result depends wholly on the
efficiency with which these vibrations are produced, so that breathing
and tone are brought together, so to speak, by the mediation of these
little bands, the vocal cords; and this is the justification for
speaking of the larynx as _the_ vocal organ. This usage, however, is
objectionable, as it tends to narrowness and to divert the mind from
other highl