human heart--neither could have accomplished the
purpose alone--which sent hundreds of shell-shocks, as they came to be
called (people used to call the condition by an uglier, if not a
shorter, term) back into the lines with self-respect and nerve renewed.

To turn to another field, it was a real scholar, even if he were also a
dean, who, in spite of the best efforts of his practical associates to
deter him, brought order out of chaos in the most important of our war
boards through the collection and skillful presentation of statistical
data.

In many cases it was the scholar whom we must thank for the pointing out
of the obvious. The early drafts rejected thousands of excellent
potential soldiers because our existing height regulations were drawn
for men of the northern European races; and the minimum height limit was
well within the normal variation of the men of southern European
ancestry, which has been so large an element in our recent immigration.
Similarly, men of science have pointed out that the length of the
marching step depends not alone on the length of the legs, but even more
on the width of the hips, a simple fact which is of real military
significance. The scholars in the Forest Products laboratories knew how
to make boxes that would not break and spill their contents on the
wharves at Hoboken or St. Nazaire, and, equally important, they knew
how to educate the quartermasters to use them.

The fact that in many fields we reached the limits of available
man-power meant a wonderful stimulation to the study of certain problems
affecting human welfare. Take for example the physiological aspects of
industrial fatigue. In this field an excellent theoretical start had
been made before the war, but the appeal was limited to those interested
in the individual worker. With the war, however, and the shortage of
labor, came a new and, I fear, a more potent appeal--the interest in the
product and its prompt production. The worker who collapsed could not be
replaced. Long hours or unsanitary surroundings meant spoiled material
and broken-down machinery and resultant delay. And when there was a
scholar at hand to show why this was so, you may be sure he had his day
in court.

The work of the scholar has not wholly been in getting things done.
Perhaps an equally important side was in keeping impossible or
unprofitable things from being attempted. When time was of the very
essence of the whole program, the man who co