Next to these whose elocution is absorbed in action, and who converse
chiefly with their arms and legs, we may consider the Profest Speakers.
And first, the Emphatical, who squeeze, and press, and ram down every
syllable with excessive vehemence and energy. These orators are
remarkable for their distinct elocution and force of expression; they
dwell on the important particulars _of_ and _the_, and the significant
conjunction _and_, which they seem to hawk up, with much difficulty, out
of their own throats, and to cram them, with no less pain, into the ears
of their auditors. These should be suffered only to syringe (as it were)
the ears of a deaf man, through a hearing-trumpet; tho I must confess
that I am equally offended with the Whisperers or Low-speakers, who seem
to fancy all their acquaintance deaf, and come up so close to you that
they may be said to measure noses with you, and frequently overcome you
with the full exhalations of a foul breath. I would have these oracular
gentry obliged to speak at a distance through a speaking-trumpet, or
apply their lips to the walls of a whispering-gallery. The Wits who will
not condescend to utter anything but a _bon-mot_, and the Whistlers or
Tune-hummers, who never articulate at all, may be joined very agreeably
together in concert; and to these tinkling cymbals I would also add the
sounding brass, the Bawler, who inquires after your health with the
bellowing of a town-crier.
The Tattlers, whose pliable pipes are admirably adapted to the "soft
parts of conversation," and sweetly "prattling out of fashion," make
very pretty music from a beautiful face and a female tongue; but from a
rough manly voice and coarse features mere nonsense is as harsh and
dissonant as a jig from a hurdy-gurdy.
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