"Second Wind." A city man frequently sets out on a mountain tramp without any muscular preparation for the trip. He walks ten or fifteen miles when his average is not over one or two. Sometimes after a few hours he feels himself exhausted, but a glorious view opens out before him and he goes on with new zest. He has merely increased his rate of repair and drawn on a new stock of energy. That night he is tired, and the next day he is likely to be stiff and sore. There is a little fatigue left in him, but it takes only a day or two for the body to be wholly refreshed, especially if he hastens the process by another good walk. Up to a certain point, far beyond our usual limit, the more we do, the more we can do.
One day after a long walk my little daughter said that she could go no farther and waited to be carried. But she soon spied a dog on ahead and ran off after him with new zest. She followed the dog back and forth, running more than a mile before she reached home, and then in the exuberance of her spirits, ran around the house three times.
The Emotions Again. What is the key that unlocks new stores of energy and drives away fatigue? What is it in the amateur mountain-climbers that helps the body maintain its new standard? What keeps indefatigable workers on the job long after the ordinary man has tired? Is it not always an invigorating
emotion,—the zest of pursuit, the joy of battle, intense interest in work, or a new enthusiasm? All great military commanders know the importance of morale. They know that troops can stand more while they are going forward than while running away, that the more contented and hopeful they are, the better fighters they make; discouragement, lack of interest, the fighting of a losing game, dearth of appreciation, futility of effort, monotony of task, all conspire in soldier or civilian to use up and to lock up energy which might have been available for real work. Approaching the matter from a new angle, we find once more that the difference between strength and weakness is in many cases merely a difference in the emotions and feeling-tones which habitually control.
Fatigue is a safety-device of nature to keep us within safe limits, but it is a device toward which we must not become too sensitive. As a rule it makes us stop long before the danger point is reached. If we fall into the habit of watching its first signals, they may easily become so insistent that they monopolize attention. Attention increases any sensation, especially if colored by fear. Fear adds to the waste matter of fatigue little driblets of adrenalin and other secretions which must somehow be eliminated before equilibrium is reestablished. This creates a vicious circle. We are tired, hence we are discouraged. We are discouraged,
hence we are more tired. This kind of "tire" is a chemical condition, but it is produced not by work but by an emotion. He who learns to take his fatigue philosophically, as a natural and harmless phenomenon which will soon disappear if ignored, is likely to find himself possessed of exceptional strength. We can stand almost any amount of work, provided we do not multiply it by worry. We can even stand a good deal of real anxiety provided it is not turned in on ourselves and directed toward our own health.
"Decent Hygienic Conditions." If fatigue products cannot pile up, why is extra rest ever needed? Because there is a limit to the supply of fuel. If the fat-supply stored away for such emergencies finally becomes low, we may need an extra dose of sleeping and eating in order to let the reservoirs fill again. But this never takes very long. The body soon fills in its reserves if it has anything like common-sense care. The doctrine of reserve energy does not warrant a careless burning of the candle at both ends. It presupposes "decent hygienic conditions,"—eight hours in bed, three square meals a day, and a fair amount of fresh air and exercise.
"Over There." On the other hand, the stories that floated back to us from the war zone illustrate in the most powerful way what the human body can do when necessity forbids the slightest attention to its needs.
One of the best of these stories is Dorothy Canfield's account of Dr. Girard-Mangin, "France's Fighting Woman Doctor." Better than any abstract discussion of human endurance is this vibrant narrative of that little woman, "not very strong, slightly built, with some serious constitutional weakness," who lived through hardships and accomplished feats of daring which would have been considered beyond the range of possibility—before the war.
Think of her out there in her leaky makeshift hospital with her twenty crude helpers and her hundreds of mortally sick typhoid patients; four hundred and seventy days of continuous service with no place to sleep—when there was a chance—except a freezing, wind-swept attic in a deserted village. Think of her in the midst of that terrible Battle of Verdun, during four black nights without a light, among those delirious men, and then during the long, long ride with her dying patients over the shell-swept roads. Listen to her as she speaks of herself at the end of that ride, without a place to lay her head: "Oh, then I did feel tired! That morning for the first time I knew how tired I was, as I went dragging myself from door to door begging for a room and a bed. It was because I was no longer working, you see. As long as you have work to do you can go on." Then listen to her as she receives her orders to rush to a new post, before she has had time