Two lyceum assemblies, of five hundred each,
are so nearly alike, that they are absolutely undistinguishable in
many cases by any definite mark, and there is nothing but the place
and time by which one can tell the "remarkably intelligent
audience" of a town in New York or Ohio from one in any New England
town of similar size. Of course, if any principle of selection has
come in, as in those special associations of young men which are
common in cities, it deranges the uniformity of the assemblage.
But let there be no such interfering circumstances, and one knows
pretty well even the look the audience will have, before he goes
in. Front seats: a few old folk,--shiny-headed,--slant up best
ear towards the speaker,--drop off asleep after a while, when the
air begins to get a little narcotic with carbonic acid. Bright
women's faces, young and middle-aged, a little behind these, but
toward the front--(pick out the best, and lecture mainly to that.)
Here and there a countenance, sharp and scholarlike, and a dozen
pretty female ones sprinkled about. An indefinite number of pairs
of young people,--happy, but not always very attentive. Boys, in
the background, more or less quiet. Dull faces here, there,--in
how many places! I don't say dull PEOPLE, but faces without a ray
of sympathy or a movement of expression. They are what kill the
lecturer. These negative faces with their vacuous eyes and stony
lineaments pump and suck the warm soul out of him;--that is the
chief reason why lecturers grow so pale before the season is over.
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