a vein extracts of thyroid, parathyroid, or adrenal glands, they will immediately reinvigorate the failing contractions.  The injections must be made before the fatigue is carried to the point of absolute exhaustion.  It follows that these glands normally pour into the circulation substances which counteract the effect of fatigue substances, and in fact make possible muscular recuperation from fatigue throughout the day as well as in emergencies and crises.

Fatigue, conventionally recognized, is something acute and urgent.  As such it means a violent draining of the endocrine wells.  But there is also a chronic fatigue, which has been dignified with the name of Fatigue Disease.  Bernard Shaw once asked for someone to tell him the name of the germ causing the symptoms of overwork.  That being impossible, he will have to be satisfied with the answer that it is not a germ, but an internal secretion, or rather a defect of internal secretion that is the cause.

Whether or not the adrenals have been damaged by past experiences, and upon their capacity to respond to the necessities of an occasion, fatigue reactions primarily depend.  A quotation from Sir James MacKenzie, most distinguished of modern English students of medicine, summarizes the matter neatly.  “Abelous, and Langlois and Albanese have studied the relation of the adrenal bodies to fatigue....  They infer that the muscular weakness following removal of the adrenals is due to toxic substances.  In view of our present knowledge of the physiological action of adrenaline in its various forms, it seems more probable that the weakness is to be explained by the absence of the normal tone producing internal secretions of the bodies in question.”  In other words, the adrenals regulate muscle tone.  They produce nature’s tonics for weary tissues.  The chronic lassitude of thousands of our generation, suffering from “that tired feeling,” may be put down to chronic adrenal insufficiency.

It requires no superlative imagination to see that an adrenal poor subject does not belong upon a job that involves muscle stress over a long period, or indeed fatiguing conditions of any sort.  Nor that a thyroid poor individual is not the best choice for a position that demands a keen, alert body and mind.  In the selection of executives, the nature and stamina of the pituitary will undoubtedly be taken very seriously in the near future.

A certain hocus-pocus concerning character reading, a perverted revival of the ancient phrenology and physiognomy, has invaded the employment territory in America as the newest charlatanism.  The study of the internal secretions, including blood and X-ray examinations, will surely assist the demand for a truly scientific estimate of constitution and character that can be relied upon in the classification and distribution of personnel.

THE PROSPECTS FOR PUBLIC HEALTH