SPEECH IMPEDIMENT.

Otago Witness, Volume 06, Issue 2899, 6 October 1909, Page 53

SPEECH IMPEDIMENT.

A SCHOOL FOR STAMMERERS. Lonely; misunderstood; a people apart? separated from their kind for lack of the silver shibboleth of speech — such are the stammerers How sensitive they are iv regard to their impediment, how despairing in regard to a cure, was touched upon by Mr G L. Johnston, taßcinjr to a representative of the Otago Daily Times ore September 20. It ira also gathered from the same source that there is a deeply-rooted prejudice in the minds of many to the effect that there is no cure At t.he Palace Hotel, where Mr Johnston holds his classes, is proof to the contrary, am) last evening our reporter was introduced lo the pupils and the system. The defect fiom which a stammerer suffers is too painful to dwell upon, and our representative wag fully prepared for a rather harrowing experience, especially as the senior pupil had received only a fortnight's tuition, and fcho junior had joined l the class only on Saturday afternoon. However, these unpleasant anticipations we-ro ir- no vvav realised, and the demonstration* was «. revelation. A few exercises ir t counting (m millions) were first gon.3 through, the entire absence of baste andt gicat clarify of diction bean-g the meet noticeable Matures. Members of the das* next spoke as for dictation, and still no si^ns of stammering were apparent. They then rose, one after the other, and delivered extempore speeches. With one exception lh<>:-<- were no signs of nervousness or even of awkwardness. Ideas and word* flowed spontaneously, and the impression conveyed was that the gentlemen present* ppoke a great <tea| better than the average talker. It seemed incredible that these fluent, collected men had, a few days since, boen confirmed and apparently hopeless stammerers : but in addition to the statement* of Sir Johnston — himself a cured stammerer — there wa* the testimony of the pupils One ant 1 all spoke of the yeara — "'the long. lons year*'* — when to commimicato to a friend had beep an effort ; and) to speak to a number -ar impossibility. Xow. thanks to the Beaslej system, t/hew regarded themselves, if not exactly cured,to be. at anvratf. on the high road to it. One pupil wae rather behind the others. The reason he gave for thie was that ho had tried a number of alleged cures, and .•=o had a great. deal to unlearn, while the* o+,hei<! had approached the matter with an: open mind Mcv-t of the pupils had been 6tammei<Ts from childhood, and ono acknowledge] that he contracted the habit from a child of fh-e by mimioking another. The other grew out of it, but the mimic did not. Mr Johnston was cured by mean* of the Beaslev treatment, under the guidance of Mr W J Ketley, and since hia on re has set himself to cure others. Ha say-,: "'You ace, J know what it feel* like to be a stammerer, and whether it pays me or not I am making this my life work.' 1 Mr Johnston is the only pupil who hat been entrusted with the system, and \t the Australasian representative of tht Beasley system. He intends founding r school foy stammerere. To the question " Will you guarantee a onre?" he replies, " Yes ;" if you will guarantee to follow my instructions." If Mr Johnston has anothei object in life it ifc be saye, to "kill" th«