Among distinguished Canadians, Sir Thomas White is one of the most interesting speakers.  His versatile mind, and broad and varied experience, enable him to converse with almost equal facility upon politics, medicine, finance, law, science, art, literature, or business.  Dates, details, facts, figures, and illustrations are at his ready command.  His manner is natural, courteous, and genial, but in argumentation the whole man is so thoroughly aroused to earnestness and intensity as almost to overwhelm an opponent.  His greatest quality in speaking is his manifest sincerity, and it is this particularly which has ingratiated him in the hearts of his countrymen.

The Honorable Joseph H. Choate must certainly be reckoned among the best conversationalists of our time.  His manner, both in conversation and in public speaking, is singularly gracious and winning.  He is unsurpassed as a story-teller.  His fine taste, combined with long experience as a public man, makes him an ideal after-dinner speaker.

Some eminent men try to mask their greatness when engaged in conversation.  They do not wear their feelings nor their greatness on their sleeves.  Some have an utter distaste for anything like personal display.  It is said of the late Henry James that a stranger might talk to him for an entire evening without discovering his identity.

There is an interesting account of an evening’s conversation between Emerson and Thoreau.  When Thoreau returned home he wrote in his Journal:  “Talked, or tried to talk, with R.W.E.  Lost my time, nay, almost my identity.  He, assuming a false opposition where there was no difference of opinion, talked to the wind.”  Emerson’s version of the conversation was this:  “It seemed as if Thoreau’s first instinct on hearing a proposition was to controvert it.  That habit is chilling to the social affections; it mars conversation.”

Conversation offers daily opportunity for intellectual exercise of high order.  The reading of great books is desirable and indispensable to education, but real culture comes through the additional training one receives in conversation.  The contact of mind with mind tends to stimulate and develop thoughts which otherwise would probably remain dormant.

The culture of conversation is to be recommended not only for its own sake, but also as one of the best means of training in the art of public speaking.  Since the best form of platform address today is simply conversation enlarged and elevated, it may almost be assumed that to excel in one is to be proficient in the other.

Good conversation requires, among other things, mental alertness, accuracy of statement, adequate vocabulary, facility of expression, and an agreeable voice, and these qualities are most essential for effective public speaking.  Everyone, therefore, who aspires to speaking before an audience of hundreds or thousands, will find his best opportunity for preliminary training in everyday speech.