“But I should have thought they would be so fatigued that you would lose as much as you gain, or more perhaps,” I said.
“Oh no,” he answered; “they are allowed one day’s complete rest, which they must spend in bed; their diet is arranged, both during the time and for a month after. They must go to bed for two hours extra every night for the following month. The effect is most beneficial. They like it too, on the whole, for they get paid for all the extra product—that is to say, it is added to their pension fund.”
“But I thought the pension fund was so calculated,” I said, “that it tallies exactly with what is required for the support of each man from the time he ceases to be able to work.”
“Certainly,” he replied. “After fifty-five most of our men work an hour a day less every two years, with variations according to their capacity, as tested by the medical examinations.”
“Then how do they benefit,” I asked, “by the product of the strenuous month, if it is only added to their pension and not paid at the time?”
“If it is added to the pension fund,” he replied, “it is obvious that they must benefit.”
I did not pursue the matter further. He asked me if I had been to the Annual Medical Exhibition. I said I had not heard of it, and did not suppose I should receive permission to see it, as I was not altogether well qualified to understand it. He said it was most interesting. He was not a medical man himself, of course; but as an officer in the army he had had to get some acquaintance with physiology.
“The medical menagerie gets more interesting every year,” he said.
“The medical menagerie!” I exclaimed. “Whatever is that?”
“It is a wonderful collection of animals, not only domestic but wild animals too, upon which experiments have been carried out. There are goats with sheep’s legs. There are cows with horses’ hearts, and dogs with only hind-legs, and pigs without livers—oh, all sorts of things. The funniest is a pig with a tiger’s skin.”