After considering the nature of the occasion and getting himself in harmony with it, the speaker should next consider the relation of his particular subject to the occasion and to the subjects of the other speakers. He should be careful to hold closely to the subject allotted to him so that he will not encroach upon the ground of other speakers. He should be careful, too, not to appropriate to himself any of their time. And he should consider, without vanity and without humility, his own relative importance and govern himself accordingly. We have all had the painful experience of waiting in impatience for the speech of the evening to begin while some humble citizen made "a few introductory remarks."

In planning his speech and in getting it into finished form, the toaster will do well to remember those three essentials to all good composition with which he struggled in school and college days, Unity, Mass and Coherence. The first means that his talk must have a central thought, on which all his stories, anecdotes and jokes will have a bearing; the second that there will be a proper balance between the parts, that it will not be all introduction and conclusion; the third, that it will hang together, without awkward transitions. A toast may consist, as Lowell said, of "a platitude, a quotation and an anecdote," but the toaster must exercise his ingenuity in putting these together.

In delivering the toast, the speaker must of course be natural. The after-dinner speech calls for a conversational tone, not for oratory of voice or manner. Something of an air of detachment on the part of the speaker is advisable. The humorist who can tell a story with a straight face adds to the humorous effect.

A word might be said to those who plan the program. In the number of speakers it is better to err in having too few than too many. Especially is this true if there is one distinguished person who is _the_ speaker of the occasion. In such a case the number of lesser lights may well be limited to two or three. The placing of the guest of honor on the program is a matter of importance. Logically he would be expected to come last, as the crowning feature. But if the occasion is a large semi-public affair--a political gathering, for example--where strict etiquet does not require that all remain thru the entire program, there will always be those who will leave early, thus missing the best part of the entertainment. In this case some shifting of speakers, even at the risk of an anti-climax, would be advisable. On ordinary occasions, where the speakers are of much the same rank, order will be determined mainly by subject. And if the topics for discussion are directly related, if they are all component parts of a general subject, so much the better.

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