No matter how good a man's voice is
naturally in the low register, the temptation of example in most cases is
to glide into the national twang. To a certain extent, Davenport had done
this. But, through his practice of singing, as well as of reading verse
aloud for his own pleasure, he knew that his lower voice was, in the
slang phrase, 'all there.' He knew, also, of a somewhat curious way of
bringing the lower voice into predominance; of making it become the
habitual voice, to the exclusion of the higher tones. Of course one can
do this in time by studied practice, but the constant watchfulness is
irksome and may lapse at any moment. The thing was, to do it once and for
all, so that the quick unconscious response to the mind's order to speak
would be from the lower voice and no other. Davenport took Mr. Bud's
dictionary, opened it at U, and recited one after another all the words
beginning with that letter as pronounced in 'under.' This he did through
the whole list, again and again, hour after hour, monotonously, in the
lower register of his voice. He went through this practice every day,
with the result that his deeper notes were brought into such activity as
to make them supplant the higher voice entirely. Pronunciation has
something to do with voice effect, and, besides, his complete
transformation required some change in that on its own account. This was
easy, as Davenport had always possessed the gift of imitating dialects,
foreign accents, and diverse ways of speech.
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