Stammering, Its Cause and Cure | Page 9

unless it was Old
Sol, our family driving horse.
Jim used to go with me on all my jaunts--I could talk to him by the
hour and never stammer a word. And Old Sol--well, when everything
seemed to be going against me, I used to go out and talk things over
with Old Sol. Somehow he seemed to understand--he used to whinney
softly and rub his nose against my shoulder as if to say, "I understand,
Bennie, I understand!"
Somehow my father had discovered this peculiarity of my
affliction--that is, my ability to talk to animals or when alone.

Something suggested to him that my stammering could be cured, if I
could be kept by myself for several weeks. With this thought in mind,
he suggested that I go on a hunting and fishing trip in the wilds of the
northwest, taking no guide, no companion of any sort, so that there
would be no necessity of my speaking to any human being while I was
gone.
My father's idea was that if my vocal organs had a complete rest, I
would be restored to perfect speech. As I afterwards proved to my own
satisfaction by actual trial, this idea was entirely wrong. You can not
hope to restore the proper action of your vocal organs by ceasing to use
them. The proper functioning of any bodily organ is the result, not of
ceasing to use it at all, but rather of using it correctly.
This can be very easily proved to the satisfaction of any one. Take the
case of the small boy who boasts of his muscle. He is conscious of an
increasing strength in the muscles of his arm not because he has failed
to use these muscles but because he has used them continually, causing
a faster-than-ordinary development.
You can readily imagine that I looked forward to my "vacation" with
keen anticipation, for I had never been up in the northwest and I was
full of stories I had read and ideas I had formed of its wonders.
The trip, lasting two weeks, did me scarcely any good at all. The most I
can say for it is that it quieted my nerves and put me in somewhat
better physical condition, which a couple of weeks in the outdoor
country would do for any growing boy.
But this trip did not cure my stammering, nor did it tend to alleviate the
intensity of the trouble in the least, save through a lessened nervous
state for a few days. Today, after twenty-eight years' experience, I
know that it would be just as sensible to say that a wagon stuck in the
soft mud would get out by "resting" there as it is to say that stammering
can be eradicated by allowing the vocal organs to rest through disuse.
Shortly after my return from the trip to the northwest, my father died,
with the result that our household was, for a time, very much broken up.

For a while, at least, my stammering, though not forgotten, did not
receive a great deal of attention, for there were many other things to
think about.
The summer following my father's death, however, I began again my
so-far fruitless search for a cure for my stammering, this time placing
myself under the care and instruction of a man claiming to be "The
World's Greatest Specialist in the Cure of Stammering." He may have
been the world's greatest specialist, but not in the cure of stammering.
He did succeed, however, by the use of his absurd methods, in putting
me through a course that resulted in the membrane and lining of my
throat and vocal organs becoming irritated and inflamed to such an
extent that I was compelled to undergo treatment for a throat affection
that threatened to be as serious as the stammering itself.
I tried everything that came to my attention--first one thing and then
another--but without results. Still I refused to be discouraged. I kept on
and on, my mother constantly encouraging and reassuring me. And you
will later see that I found a method that cured me.
There are always those who stand idly about and say, "It can't be
done!" Such people as these laughed at Fulton with his steamboat, they
laughed at Stephenson and his steam locomotive, they laughed at
Wright and the airplane.
They say, "It can't be done"--but it is done, nevertheless.
I turned a deaf ear to the people who tried to convince me that it
couldn't be done. I had a firm belief in that old adage, "Where there is a
will there is a way," and I made another of my own, which said, "I will
FIND a way or MAKE one!"
And I did!

CHAPTER IV

A STAMMERER HUNTS A JOB
After