[97]
It was
with this gesture that I believe Demosthenes to
have commenced the timid and subdued exordium
of his speech in defence of Ctesiphon, and it was,
I think, in such a position that Cicero1 held his
land, when he said, “If I have any talent, though
I am conscious how little it is.” Slightly greater
freedom may be given to the gesture by pointing
the fingers down and drawing the hand in towards
the body and then opening it somewhat more rapidly
in the opposite direction, so that it seems as though
it were delivering our words to the audience.
1 pro Arch. i. 1.
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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