observant; that is, if his character continue
timid and reserved. If, on the contrary, his
mind is irritated by the consciousness of his
strange condition, the stammerer is soured
into hasty irascibility, and his physiognomy
acquires a passionate and violent expression.

But, stammering is not always continuous
in its hold on the patient; it is sometimes
subject to intermittent fits. Although the
cause of the phenomenon is not always
appreciable, it has nevertheless been observed
that there are stammerers who manifest a
marked susceptibility to atmospheric
influences, and who hesitate more or less
according as the weather is dry or moist, hot
or cold. A multitude of external
circumstances exert their influence on stammerers:
one will hesitate more when he is in company
with a large number of people; another, on
the contrary, will get the master of his
infirmity on such occasions. Some are incapable
of reading without stammering much; others
will not stammer at all when they read aloud,
or declaim what they have learnt by heart.
Frequently, stammerers are able to sing, to
recite verses—Alexandrines especially—
without the slightest difficulty. Nevertheless,
the rule is not without its exceptions; there
are persons who stammer even when they
sing. There are certain stammerers who
speak fluently when carried away by the heat
of passion; others, under the same influence,
make unheard-of efforts, in vain. Their
respiration is stopped, the countenance
becomes convulsed, and they experience a
veritable suffocation without being able to
pronounce a single word, or even to emit a vocal
sound.

It is not rare for stammerers who have
assumed a mask, to cease to stammer under
their disguise; the fact probably results as
much from the hardihood conferred by the
incognito as from the high tenor or falsetto
voice in which masqueraders are accustomed
to speak. Natural strength of mind and
force of character, joined to the unremitting
attention which certain stammerers have paid
to their own symptoms, have enabled them
occasionally to improve their elocution, and
even completely to vanquish their infirmity.
But such spontaneous and permanent cures
more frequently and more naturally arise, as
has been stated, from the progress of maturity
and the approach of old age. It has been
asserted that women never stammer; it is
correct that they are much more rarely so
affected than men. If we may confide in the
statistics of psellism, one man out of every
two thousand five hundred stammers, whereas
only one woman in twenty thousand, halts
in her speech. The fair sex retain
unimpeached their established repute for fluency
of tongue.

It is important to know which organ, the
brain or the tongue, is at fault in each special
case of stammering; for, this form of impeded
utterance has been attempted to be cured in
two ways—morally, or by mental influence,
and physically, or by surgical agency. As
strabismus, or cross eye, is caused by the
undue tension of certain muscles, and has
been cured—temporarily, at least—by
division of the overtight muscle, so stammering
has been suspected to arise from extreme
contraction of certain muscles of the tongue,
and its cure has been actually attempted by
the operation of dividing the offending muscles.
What success or durable improvement
has resulted from the experiment is not very
precisely to be ascertained. Good news would
have been sure to be trumpeted about.
Mental curative means are founded on the
supposition that stammering arises from
the speaker's imagination running on faster
than the organs of speech can follow it, and
that they trip themselves up in their haste
to start at full gallop. Natural timidity of
character is another cause assigned for the
affection. Apoplexy, even, and bad fevers
are said to have had the same result. Reading
aloud is a restrictive discipline, and so is
a previously arranged conversation. The
master agrees with his pupil, thus:—We will
talk about such a subject; I will put a series
of questions having reference to the views of
the question which I now propound to you.
You will think them over and be prepared to
answer them. We will be quite alone; I
will sit opposite to you, looking you full in
the face. Reply deliberately, and let us try
if we cannot conclude our interview without
a stammering fit, and with the least hesitation
possible.

Chanting, instead of speaking, or talking
in recitative like operatic dialogues, has been
tried as a mode of training. It is useless to
think of it as a permanent mode of expressing
ideas: because the patient would be as
conspicuous in society for his song, as he had
been for his hesitation. As an exercise, it
may do good, and is founded on the circumstance
that almost all habitual stutterers
cease to stammer if they sing words to a well-
known air. A stammering domestic burst
into a room, to tell his master some important
news. His vocal organs were convulsed
and dumb. The more violent were his efforts
to speak, the less could his words find utterance.

"Sing what you have to say," cried the
head of the household, out of patience; when
the dumb man warbled the tune of God save
the King, to a triplet which he improvised:

"Send for the fi-ire-men,
Send for the fire-men, the
House is on fire!"

Be it observed that, in singing, the inspirations
are measured and regulated, which is in
accordance with Dr. Lindt's theory of cure.

The best authorities maintain that the
exciting cause of stammering is cerebral in its
nature; although what that cause precisely
is, may remain among the mysteries of science.