has, in many cases, followed this practice. More time and energy are devoted to the acquirement of what the late Emil Behnke called "mere acrobatic skill" than is given to the purely artistic side of voice use, and it follows that we get "the survival _not_ of the fittest" but rather of those with exceptionally strong physical organisations, instead of refined artists. The deterioration throughout the whole compass of the voice is often painfully noticeable during an entire song, but the forcible shouting of a full, high-pitched note at its close seems to be intended to compensate for all the misery previously endured by the sensitive listener. Now the maintenance of a healthy condition of the vocal muscles depends to a great degree upon the right use of those muscles in the formation of tone. There should never be any feeling of fatigue, strain, pricking, tightness, aching, or of pain in the throat, nor yet of huskiness after vocal practice. The method of voice use which produces such results, or any one of them, is wrong. Nature is pointing out as forcibly as possible the injury which is being done. Her warning should be heeded before conditions, getting worse, lead up to the sad ailments from which so many suffer, and which are disastrous to both voice and health. The foregoing facts and illustrations force upon us the conclusion that the large majority of throat affections from which both speakers and singers suffer might be entirely prevented by correct methods of voice use. As prevention is proverbially better than cure, it must be infinitely more advantageous to acquire correct methods than to unlearn bad ones which exercise a deleterious influence, always recognisable even when entire voice failure has not followed their practice. _APPENDIX TO THE TENTH EDITION_ DOES DIAPHRAGMATIC BREATHING APPLY EQUALLY TO WOMEN AS TO MEN? In a kind notice of the first edition of this brochure, which appeared in _The Medical Press_, the editor raises the above question. He says: "The evils attending faulty methods of voice-production are pointed out both from an anatomical and from an artistic point of view, diaphragmatic breathing being especially insisted on in opposition to mere clavicular breathing. This is undoubtedly correct; but we think the advice here embodied would have been even more valuable had the authoress mentioned if from her experience she thought it applied in an equal extent to both sexes, as it is well known that nature, or we may perhaps more correctly say, the art of dress, causes women to breathe in a far more 'clavicular manner' than men." This is a valuable criticism, and as the point indicated is likely to be of interest to many persons, I append my reply, which appeared in the next number of _The Medical Press_:-- "To the Editor of the _Medical Press and Circular_.