A Professor of Public Speaking (21)

“Let your friends spring to their feet constantly and pay you for their dinners by lending you a hand whenever they perceive that you are about to fall down, and giving you a chance to find what to say next in the intervals afforded by their applause. Of course you must make it your business to have a well-attuned chorus of your own.[*] “There you have what concerns the speaking. Afterwards let them[*] dance attendance upon you as you go away with your head swathed in your mantle, reviewing what you have said. And if any one accosts you, make marvellous assertions about yourself, be extravagant in your self-praise, and make yourself a nuisance to him.[*] ‘What was Demosthenes beside me?’ ‘Perhaps one of the ancients is in the running with me!’ and that sort of thing.