he solution of the problem. This is Nature's way
of bringing one part into harmonious relations with another. As by a
telegraphic system the most distant parts of a vast railway system may
be brought into harmonious working, so is it with the body by means of
the nervous system. The nerve-centres correspond to the heads of the
railway system, or, perhaps more correctly, to the various officials
resident in some large city who from this centre regulate the affairs
of the whole line.

The muscular system is made up of cells of two kinds, those
characteristic of the muscles used in ordinary movements, and those
employed for the movements of the internal organs. The muscles of the
limbs are made up of striped muscle-cells; those of the stomach, etc.,
of unstriped cells. These latter are slower to act when stimulated,
contract more slowly, and cease to function more tardily when the
stimulus is withdrawn.

The muscular mechanisms used by the singer and speaker are of the
skeletal variety.

If it be true that the welfare of one part of the body is bound up
with that of every other, as are the interests of one member of a firm
with those of another, in a great business, it will at once appear
that the most perfect results can follow for the voice-user only under
certain conditions. However perfect by nature the vocal mechanism, the
result in any case must be largely determined by the character of the
body as a whole. The man of fine physique generally has naturally more
to hope for than one with an ill-developed body.

In the natural working of the body the stimulus to a muscle is
nervous; hence we may appropriately, and often to advantage, speak of
_neuro-muscular_ mechanism, the nervous element being as important as
the muscular.

In a later chapter it will be shown that the work of the singer and
speaker when most successfully carried out must be largely reflex in
nature--a fact on which hang weighty considerations with regard to
many questions, among them methods of practice, the influence of
example, etc.--be he ever so much the natural artist. It will be the
writer's aim, however, to give such warnings and advice as may assist
each reader in his own best development. Many who began with a
comparatively poor physical stock in trade have surpassed the
self-satisfied ones who trusted too much to what nature gave them.
Singers as well as others would do well to believe that _Labor omnia
vincit_.

SUMMARY.

The s