At that time, Gladstone's "appearance and manners were much in his favor. His countenance was mild and pleasant; his eyes were clear and quick; his eyebrows were dark and prominent; his gestures varied but not violent; his jet black hair was parted from his crown to his brow;" his voice was peculiarly musical, and his diction was elegant and easy, without giving the appearance of previous elaboration. How far his language and thoughts were premeditated I will not undertake to say. Daniel Webster once declared that there was no such thing as _ex tempore_ speaking,--a saying not altogether correct, but in the main confirmed by many great orators who confess to laborious preparation for their speech-making, and by the fact that many of our famous after-dinner speakers have been known to send their speeches to the Press before they were delivered. The case of Demosthenes would seem to indicate the necessity of the most careful study and preparation in order to make a truly great speech, however gifted an orator may be; and those who, like the late Henry Ward Beecher, have astonished their hearers by their ready utterances have generally mastered certain lines of fact and principles of knowledge which they have at command, and which, with native power and art of expression, they present in fresh forms and new combinations. They do not so much add new stores of fact to the kaleidoscope of oratory,--they place the familiar ones in new positions, and produce new pictures _ad infinitum_. Sometimes a genius, urged by a great impulse, may dash out in an untried course of thought; but this is not always a safe venture,--the next effort of the kind may prove a failure. No man can be sure of himself or his ground without previous and patient labor, except in reply to an antagonist and when familiar with his subject. That was the power of Fox and Pitt. What gave charm to the speeches of Peel and Gladstone in their prime was the new matter they introduced before debate began; and this was the result of laborious study. To attack such matter with wit and sarcasm is one thing; to originate it is quite another. Anybody can criticise the most beautiful picture or the grandest structure, but to paint the one or erect the other,--_hic labor, hoc opus est_. One of the grandest speeches ever made, for freshness and force, was Daniel Webster's reply to Hayne; but the peroration was written and committed to memory, while the substance of it had been in his thoughts for half a winter, and his mind was familiar with the general subject. The great orator is necessarily an artist as much as Pascal was in his _Pensées_; and his fame will rest perhaps more on his art than on his matter,--since the art is inimitable and peculiar, while the matter is subject to the conditions of future, unknown, progressive knowledge. Probably the most effective speech of modern times was the short address of Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg; but this was simply the expression of the