COMMONS ORATORS

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 138, 7 December 1912, Page 19

COMMONS ORATORS

A CONTEMPORARY ESTIMATE BY A RISING UNIONIST. In the Oxford and Cambridge Review. Mr. F. E. Smith, M.P., the most noted of the younger speakers in the Unionist party, discusses the Parliamentary oratory of to day, He dissents from tho current talk about the decay of Parliamentary eloquence. Ho things there are a certain number of members now who could have conformed with striking and even brilliant ( success to the Parliamentary standards of fifty years ago. ME. BALFOUB. Nothing would persuade Mr. Smith that there has ever been a time in the history of the House of Commons in which Mr. Bali'our would not have reached his present ascendency : — "Many people can speak better. I have never heard anyone who can think aloud so brilliantly, so spontaneously, and so conclusively. I have heard Mm x ; se to speak on vital questions where it was certain that every word, reported exactly as ho tittered it, would be read and re-read by hundreds of thousands, with no notes except such as he had hurriedly scribbled on an envelope | during the progress of the debate. Often his speech as delivered has produced a great impression, sometimes an extraordinary impression, but I have never ! heard Mr. Balfour speak without reading I his speech with a Wonder infinitely greater ; for its structure, its logical evolution, and its penetrating subtlety of thought always supply elements which help him very little at the moment just because it is not possible instantly to appreciate, while listening to him, their amazing excellence. "- MR. ASQUITH. Of the present Prime Minister, Mr. F. E. Smith says :— v" He can confine his re marks within reasonable compass dimply because he possesses the gift of never saying a word too much *, he a'ways has at his command not merely the appropriate but the inevitable word; and it is therefore-never necessary for him to ] use two words where one would express | his liieaning. Whether he has prepared his speech or whether he is speaking extempore, the one word is always swiftly available. He produces,, wherever and whenever he wants them, an endloss succession of perfectly coined sentences conceived with unmatched felicity, delivered without hesitation in a Parliamentary style which is at otiee th^ envy and the despair of imitators.- He never perhaps takes a point very subtle, very recondite, very obviously out of the reach of the ordinary member of the House of Commons." MR. BONAR LAW. Here is Mr. Smith's tribute to his present chief:— "Mr. Bonar Law employs methods of preparation which are. so far as I know, unique. In bis most carefully prepared speeches he makes no notes, but formulates in his mind the sequence of his argument in tho very words in which it is to be expressed, and then_ by a series of mental rehearsals makes' himself as much master of the whole speech as if he read it from a manuscript on the table. Jt might have been supposed that such a method of preparation would have imposed an aliriost intolerable mental strain, but it appears to cause Mr. Bonar Law neither trouble , nor anxiety. _ Mr, Bonar Law's style as a speaker is peculiar to himself. He I is simple, perspicuous, and extremely cogent. Very few Latin words' overload his sentences. ' Indeed, his style and diction resemble- those of the late Mr. Bright. He possesses a pungency and a degree of combative brilliancy.' 1 MR. LLOYD GEORGE. Of the Chancellor of the Exchequer Mr. Smith speaks with more reserve: Mr. Lloyd George, he says, is undoubtedly a speaker of extraordinary variety, flair, and plausibility. He has three wholly distinct i styles of speech. The first is that of Limehouse, the second that of the House of Commons in an excited debate, the third that of the House of Commonswhen he is concerned in forwarding business and conciliating critics: — "His cleverness and address in the third method are beyond all praise. He thanks his opponents for their assistance, he compliments them upon their public spirit, he accepts their co-opera-tion with gratitude, and the whole proceeding is conducted with an ingratiating bonhomie which, at its best, is 'extraordinarily . clever, if at its worst it recalls the emollient properties of higlilyHcented soap. His second style, that employed in the combative Party speech in a full-dfess debate, does not impress me equally He is, indeed, a very adroit controversialist on these occasions, but tbe methods employed are a little crude. His speeches are wholly lacking in that literary quality which marks- all tbe best House of Commons oratory, and when he trusts, as he sometimes does, to the eloquence of the moment, it is usually more that of the platform or the pulpit than of the House of Commons." MR. WINSTON CHURCHILL. Of the First Lord of the Admiralty Mr. Smith says that he could not have made so great a reputation as a speaker without extraordinary ability, or if his perseverance and tenacity had been less dogged, for be hardly belong 3to the class of orators who are sometimes called "natural' I : —"He bestows upon his important speeches a degree of almost meticulous preparation : he elaborates and sometimes over-elaborates. Latterly an excessive dependence upon his manuscript has a little impaired the parliamentary success of some of 1 his most important speeches, but his hearers enjoy the compensating qualities of these defects. His speeches aio marked by an arresting literary quality." * Mr. Smith concludes with a 'reference to Lord Hugh Cecil. Eight years ago Mr. Winston Churchill and Lord Hugh Cecil were intimates, confederates, and, in a sense, rivals. Lord Hugh is v far more spontaneous speaker tban Mr. Churchill, and has other qualities which no one in the- House of Commons but himself possesses. He unites to the most tenacious combativeness an idealism of view which even those who arc most affronted by his controversial bitterness admit in their hearts.