e attributes of the personage who had lived
in him, vanished. His face, his form, his bearing resumed their usual
appearance. The artist disappeared, and the professor quietly resumed
his place, without seeming to notice that the audience--still shaken by
the emotions they had felt--blamed him for this too prompt
metamorphosis.

Yet Delsarte was as agreeable a teacher as he was a marvelous artist.
His instruction was enlivened by countless unexpected flashes; his
sallies were as quick as gunpowder.

"_I die!_" languidly sang a tenor.

"You sleep!" said the master.

"_Come, lady fair!_" exclaimed another singer.

"If you call her in that voice, you may believe that she will never
come!"

"Don't make a public-crier of your Achilles," said the master to some
one with a rich organ, given over to its own uncultivated power.

All three smiled. The one tried to die more fitly; the other to call his
lady fair in more seductive accents. The petulant outburst of the master
taught them more than many a long dissertation.

Delsarte made great use of his power of imitating a defect; he even
exaggerated it so that the scholar, seeing it reflected as in a
magnifying-glass, more readily perceived his insufficiency or his
exaggeration.

If this mode of procedure was somewhat trying to sensitive vanity, it
was easy to see its advantages. The master's censure, moreover, was of
that inoffensive and kindly character which is its own justification. It
was a criticism governed by gaiety. Delsarte laughed at himself quite as
readily as at the ridiculous performances which he caricatured, if
opportunity offered. And if by chance any pupil less hardened to these
assaults was intimidated or distressed, consolation was quick to follow.

I remember that a young girl gave rise to one of these striking
imitations. Delsarte put such an irresistible comedy into it, that the
audience was seized with an uncontrolable fit of mirth. The master's
mimicry had far more to do with this than the poor girl's awkwardness.
But she did not understand this. Her heart sank at this harsh merriment
and tears rushed to her eyes.

"What is the matter," asked Delsarte; "why are you so disturbed? Among
the persons whose laughter you hear, I do not think there is one who
sings as well as you do! I exaggerated your mistake to make you aware of
it; but you did your work in a way that was very satisfactory to all but
your teacher."

Speaking of this irony tempe