come, one may surely hope for a time when rich women will all crave and secure the luxury of patient-husbands.

There is no wish here to make sport of the sympathy and the practical kindness which women, and indeed almost all the laity or non-sick, feel for us. The oversensitive invalid would only laugh at it that he might not cry. It is good for him neither that others should pity him too much nor that he should be too sorry for himself; so here indeed the slogan probably should be "a rough regime for the patient." Yet in simple justice it should be said that, oftener than not, people do not know how to show pity for the ill because they do not quite understand how they the sick men-feel. And it is hoped that through the advice to the ill and the bullying of them which shall here be indulged in, something may be seen of what it is like to be an invalid and to be forced to come to terms with life in quite a new way. Sick folk are really not the most fortunate or happiest in the world, nor are they so cross-grained and cantankerous a race as they must often seem. A plea may be made for even them.

Their poor little attempts to do something for themselves are not all the product of a proud desire to be independent and to scorn help. They may merely come from a wish, as it were, to hide their weakness and not to obtrude it indecently upon others. The sick man's desire to put on his own shirt and his trembling attempt to raise the spoon containing his cereal food to his own lips may mean a rather pathetic gallantry, a perhaps despicably bad try at waving his own banner in the breeze. But as invalid to invalids, one must tell them a few truths. There are many who almost envy us the life we lead.

Most of us have at some time in our lives longed for the quiet life, for repose, the reading of good books, peaceful talk with friends and freedom from responsibility. Now, quite against our will, much of this comes to us sick men. We should at least enjoy these things. The business man and many others will say at once that to be free from care means merely to be living in want. But want so often only means that you really must cut your coat according to your cloth; and once you are

accustomed to such tailoring, so little known in America, you may find yourself not envying your spendthrift neighbors. To discover suddenly that your income is limited and yet is perforce sufficient, is really as relieving as to have come into a fortune, if to come into money would be calming. And if you ought to have more money, in a way it is a comfort to know that you, at least, can do nothing about it. Perhaps you now realize that you are married, and that to a spouse and to children you must hand over the charge of supporting you. It may also be that they like it and that you are really giving them a chance for self-development. Writing quite seriously, it is a beautiful and blessed thing that every responsibility given up, every effort abandoned, in short, every renunciation made, merely brings us what seems wealth and freedom, and gives a greater chance for wisdom to all those around our sick-beds.

Even the regimen of the invalid, with all its prohibitions and limitations, may have its own charm. In our dreams of the quiet life most of us have probably imagined bread, green vegetables (no spinach need apply), fruit, and a cup of cool water from the spring, all possibly taken from a marble table on a terrace with a view of the Grecian sea. While well, we have decided that ideally "better a dinner of herbs-where love is-than the stalled ox," etc.; and if in health a man can be so sensible, why should not some of his wisdom last into illness?

Pain is the great evil of illness. And it is admitted that the invalids spoken of here are those whose sufferings are fairly mild (as is so often true). Acute and almost intolerable torment is a matter between the sick man and his God. The problem is as old and as puzzling as that of the existence of evil. About all that can be said is that it is to be presumed that most who are ill prefer living in pain to dying, and have in the secret dark recesses of their souls struck the balance somehow. To write of all this too freely would be presumptuous and indecent. It is very usual with invalids to question whether their life is worth living and to conclude that it is not. This is presumably mostly rubbish, for, to put it quite brutally, it is always open to them to die,

except to the rare few who are truly deterred from any lack of care of themselves by religious motives. It is also common to hear that so many others would suffer by his absence that it is the duty of a patient to live. This may sometimes be true, but the wise sick man has a right to be sceptical. In any case, the truth is that most invalids do not try to live on for others but for themselves, and that it is perhaps rather a pity to talk non

sense.

Of comparatively minor matters the invalid is apt to complain. And such irritation is largely the result of his condition -is pathological, in short. It is so known and partly excused by most people. But because the invalid also has this knowledge he need not excuse himself and give free rein to his talent for lamentation.

The conditions of his life are naturally all changed and by comparison with the wild, free corsair sort of fellow of his well days he seems to have become a tame domestic animal. He is behind the scenes of the home; in particular has he been removed to the women's quarters. He experiences all the small niggling care which comes to that sex (may it make him kindlier and more understanding if he ever gets well). Perhaps, for example, he may have read in articles in the Sunday papers how household economy dictates that every left-over bit of food should be tricked out in some new way and served again; he may remark acidly, as he detects the camouflaged old dishes, that every housewife, if she can, "should keep a pig as a scavenger." This only reinforces the view that every house should have a pet patient in it, if only to eat up the scraps.

Very few well persons order their lives by any scheme, but are rather the prey of impulse. It can therefore be scarcely expected that many invalids will plan their existence. Yet it is hoped to make here some slight contributions to a philosophy which may aid them to do so. Sick folk should think sufficiently about their illness and take a reasonable amount of advice, but not too much. There is an old story in the rural districts of an invalid who tried conscientiously to follow everybody's advice and was soon reduced to a diet of chewing gum and cistern

water. Does not some such regimen seem to threaten us all? Do not take all the medicines, patent or otherwise, which are offered you, either freshly bought for you or no longer needed by others and about to be thrown away. There is such a thing as making yourself a mere drug or patent-medicine scavenger, as do so many penurious folk. Beyond observing the ordinary precautions as to his health, the invalid should spend his energy and his inventiveness making his life a succession of little festivals. How wise lately was France when she made camomile tea the momentary vogue instead of the infusion of the Chinese (or more often Indian) herb! And how profoundly, if unconsciously, sagacious was the young lady in the eighteenth-century English novel who found the waters of Bristol Spa, which she was ordered to drink, so "agreeably mawkish"! If a thing must be mawkish let us think that it is agreeably so. Verbum sap. A word to the wise sick man should be sufficient. He will in any case have ample time left for thought and meditation.

The sick man is in an excellent position for taking stock of what he possesses and planning to extract the most and the best from it. His most frequent complaint, in secrecy to himself, is that other people do not seem to realize that his illness is the most important thing in the world. They do not, for the excellent reason that it is not; not at all because they are hardhearted, unsympathetic, or forgetful. A young invalid beginning his career as sick man should at the outset try to realize a little of his unimportance even in his own little world. People do not watch us so closely as we think. If you are a cripple you may hobble along without fear. Even the roughest and least gentle often show amazing tact.

Invalids sometimes complain of the too boisterous and hearty good-will of those around. To hope that they see the sick man in "rude health" is the common wish of the unthinking, which tempts a patient to prove that ill-health can really be the rudest. And there is also the cloying optimism which many feel should be displayed before us, an optimism which would assure a man with one foot in the tomb that he radiates well-being.

If the invalid wishes his old friends to love him he must make them do so. Memories only of how agreeable he once was will not keep his grave green, if one may be permitted that expression. How agreeable he is now is the question. And this discipline is excellent for the patient if he is a fair-minded person and encour ages him to his best efforts.

If he discovers that a certain lady liked him in the past because he was an agreeable dinner guest or a good dancer, why should he complain when now that he is no longer either she does not seek him out? There is a great deal of loose and illogical talk always going on about being liked for ourselves alone. But what ourselves? Possibly many people never saw any but the dining and dancing selves, which no longer exist. And whose fault is this, pray? Not theirs certainly. Let the average invalid be only too glad if he can be liked at all for any reason.

Many things are done for the invalid which would never be done for him if he were well. Not only do people bring him insipid dishes allowed by his doctor but rich ones forbidden by the same authority. They pay him a deference rare in the modern world. They occasionally listen to what he is saying. They commonly give him the best chair in the room, and so forth. All this, of course, is not worth being ill for; but perhaps it has

never happened before, perhaps will never happen again. The patient had better take it when he can get it and ask no questions. Deference often does not beckon to a man twice. Many a family man who has never eaten the breast of chicken had better do so the first time it is offered him, even if he is flat on his back. And it is always to be remembered that the best chair in the room is the best chair.

Why are invalids so often cheerful? Not because they like being ill, nor because their characters and dispositions are so much better than the equipment of others. There is a natural wish in humanity to make the best of a bad bargain. And there is, as has been tried to point out here, a silver lining to every illness. Let no sick man be in too great a hurry either to die or to get well. Much comfort which he now enjoys will never come again. And it may be that new human relationships, made during suffering, have had a perfume that still lingers. Some memories of kindnesses given and received may perhaps throw a rosy light over the sick-bed or the wheeled chair where the invalid sat in the sun.

The wish to recover is, of course, natural and justifiable. And some people do get well. But the invalid will lose many privileges as he goes back into the world. He should beware, he may only find himself a king in exile!

THE empty house yawns gloomily Up at the empty, cloudless sky; The scorching August sun-rays beat On a dull wilderness of heat.

The pump is crumbling, red with rust;
The door is silver-white with dust.
No hay-ricks, joggling homeward, pass;
A chipmunk scuttles through the grass.

The burdock and the ragweed keep
Corners where roses used to sleep.
The crazy windows leer and stare
At ragged trees that once were fair.
And still, beneath that empty sky
It stands in changeless dignity.
Few things I know are quite as grave
As any house or quite as brave.

T

HE letters S O S, so grouped, have a multitude of meanings. Coming from a ship at sea they are a signal of distress and a plea for help; used in common speech they apply to subjects which have become distasteful through repetition. But to John Goodwin those letters described the hellish invention of some especially adept fiend.

Draw a wavering line from Verdun through Château-Thierry, and in that area south of that line, from Toul to Marseilles, you will have Goodwin's S O S. It was a maze of training camps where men were taught to load a rifle; warehouses of food, clothing, and ammunition, general and sectional headquarters, military police, and hospitals-the service of supplies. And all of it filled Goodwin with a sharp disgust.

He would have said, as he lay in one of a row of white iron beds and glared at the swarthy hospital apprentice who was trying to bluster a wounded man into taking hold of a broom, that he had always hated the SOS, hated it instinctively from the moment he had heard of it. But this would not have been true. There had been a time, from March to June, when the service of supplies seemed a desirable place to be. Unexplored, it was greatly preferable to standing in a muddy trench four hours out of every eight, sleeping in a watery dugout, and eating canned tomatoes and corned beef. It had made Goodwin anxious for a minor wound which would take him to a bed with sheets and dry blankets, where his food would be cooked and served on a plate, and toward the middle of June, as he crouched in a shell hole, to the left of Vaux, his desire was fulfilled by the German artillery. One moment he heard a softly whirring

noise, an explosion, and then through a cloud of thick, pungent gas he had rolled from his shelter, choking and gasping.

There was this to be admitted in favor of the S O S: at the evacuation hospital Goodwin had been given a bath and a clean suit of pajamas. And on the hospital train the Red Cross had given him a bar of chocolate. Other than that, nothing was to its credit. He had been made to stand in line for his food, his unlaced shoes sinking in the mud, a blanket thrown over his shoulders. He was told to make his own bed. The hospital attendants were bullies and thieves, the nurses were inattentive to the privates, and the doctors could have been less slipshod in their treatment of the patients.

"All right, soldier. Snap out of it. Almost time for inspection.

Goodwin looked up, prepared to scowl, to curse, if necessary. But it was Hawthorne, so he asked with interest: "Got a cigarette?"

'Sure, I got a cartoon, but what good does that do? Yuh can't smoke in here. Hawthorne thrust his big brown hand in his jacket pocket and exhibited a package of cigarettes.

"Lord," Goodwin sighed. "But I wish I had my clothes."

"Git 'em," said Hawthorne with succinctness. "Git 'em."

Goodwin sat up, interested. "Y gosh, I believe I will.'

"Go ahead," encouraged Hawthorne. "An' we'll beat it outa here." "Gosh- ""

"Attention!" The hospital apprentice in charge of the ward shouted warning of the inspector's approach. A row of heads on either side of the room looked sharply toward the door; the patients in uniform stood stiffly by the foot of their beds, nervously smoothing out the wrinkles in the counterpane, and the medical officer, with

a nurse and a sergeant following his bulbous hips, marched sternly into the room. Goodwin, lying with his feet together and his hands flat at his sides, wondered whether Hawthorne would go, or whether he had spoken lightly. A trip alone through the network of the SOS, with its military police and its railroad-transportation officers, would be disagreeable, but

"Carry on," called the hospital apprentice as the inspecting officer left the ward. The bodies relaxed, turning to one another to rid themselves of pent-up speech. Hawthorne approached, pushing his unloved overseas cap to one side of his head. "D'ja git it?"

Goodwin showed him the slip of paper. "Come on, then. We'll see what we kin

BFRANCE, 1917

with Hawthorne to accompany him he could have "a hell of a lot of fun." And Hawthorne, even from the little he knew of him, was not the sort of person to say what he didn't mean. The inspecting doctor was approaching and he had to decide quickly.

"Sir, can I get my clothes?" He tried to work his features into an expression of health, eagerness, of a burning desire to fight in a holy cause.

The hips, wedged in between the two beds, wedged out again, and from the wide aisle the sergeant wrote out a requisition and handed it to Goodwin, leaving him to wait, restlessly, until the undignified formality was finished for the day.

talk outa the quartermaster. You wanta take everything you can lay your hands on."

"Do you mean it, sure enough to go back to the outfit?"

"Mean it? Hell, yes, soldier. Jist watch me." And with this assurance they walked out of the ward to the commissary, indistinguishable from the other buildings in its sallow complexion, its tarred roof, its eight little windows cut in the side, and the setting of drab mud where neither trees nor grass could be seen. Only officers, nurses, and important-looking non-coms of the medical corps strolled in twos and threes, planning dances at the hideous Y. M. C. A. or