398 



a few days afterwards, and he then read it as follows : " Be 

 mather he in the kondreit of the compesiret to samtrcls amtreit 

 emtreido am temtreido mestreilerso to his eftre'ido turn hried 

 redertso of deid dat drit destrest" 



We observe here those monosyllables which are of most 

 frequent use in our language, as the, be, what, hi, that, his, 

 and was, along with several syllables almost peculiar to the 

 German language, which he was eugaged in studying at the 

 time of the apoplectic seizure; hut the main feature in the 

 case was, that although he knew when he spoke wrong, yet 

 that he was unable to speak right, notwithstanding he arti- 

 culated very difficult and unusual syllables. 



As in this case the recollection of the meaning of words 

 was retained, and it was proved that there was no paralytic 

 affection interfering with pronunciation, but that even in the 

 act of endeavouring to imitate another person, he could not 

 pronounce the right word, Dr. Osborne concluded that the 

 affection was not (as has been usually described) a loss of the 

 faculty of language or of the memory of names, while the 

 memory of things remains, but that it consisted in a loss of 

 the recollection hoic to tise the vocal apparatus. 



In stammering it is obvious that the patient knows the 

 mode in which the word is to be pronounced ; he begins it 

 rightly, but is prevented from finishing it by debility or 

 spasm on the part of the muscles, causing them to resist his 

 efforts. In this patient, on the conti'ary, the words which he 

 could write, and understood perfectly, he was unable to com- 

 mence the first syllable of, and instead of them uttered 

 words compounded from other languages. His ear afforded 

 him very little assistance, as his attempts to repeat what had 

 been read were scarcely better than his reading. The or- 

 gans were not paralysed, neither were they affected by 

 spasm, nor was he ignorant of the sounds to be uttered : it 

 only remains then that he was ignorant of the art of pro- 



