importance. But the wonderful limpidness, the charming pellucidness
of Ingersoll can only be adequately understood when you also have
the finishing touch of his facile voice.]

_Question_. I should be glad if you would tell me what you think
the differences are between English and American oratory?

_Answer_. There is no difference between the real English and the
real American orator. Oratory is the same the world over. The
man who thinks on his feet, who has the pose of passion, the face
that thought illumines, a voice in harmony with the ideals expressed,
who has logic like a column and poetry like a vine, who transfigures
the common, dresses the ideals of the people in purple and fine
linen, who has the art of finding the best and noblest in his
hearers, and who in a thousand ways creates the climate in which
the best grows and flourishes and bursts into blossom--that man is
an orator, no matter of what time, of what country.

_Question_. If you were to compare individual English and American
orators--recent or living orators in particular--what would you say?

_Answer_. I have never heard any of the great English speakers,
and consequently can pass no judgment as to their merits, except
such as depends on reading. I think, however, the finest paragraph
ever uttered in Great Britain was by Curran in his defence of Rowan.
I have never read one of Mr. Gladstone's speeches, only fragments.
I think he lacks logic. Bright was a great speaker, but he lacked
imagination and the creative faculty. Disraeli spoke for the clubs,
and his speeches were artificial. We have had several fine speakers
in America. I think that Thomas Corwin stands at the top of the
natural orators. Sergeant S. Prentiss, the lawyer, was a very
great talker; Henry Ward Beecher was the greatest orator that the
pulpit has produced. Theodore Parker was a great orator. In this
country, however, probably Daniel Webster occupies the highest
place in general esteem.

_Question_. Which would you say are the better orators, speaking
generally, the American people or the English people?

_Answer_. I think Americans are, on the average, better talkers
than the English. I think England has produced the greatest
literature of the world; but I do not think England has produced
the greatest orators of the world. I know of no English orator
equal to Webster or Corwin or Beecher.

_Question_. Would you mind telling me how it was you came t