The age-herald., 1898-10-15
FATIGUE AS
A. DISEASE

children who declined to study hard and
 persistenly were termed "lazy,' 'idle," or
 ''good for nothing"
 But we have changed all that nowadays.
 The mental, moral and physical attitude of the man. woman or child who refuses to work steadily or with anything like
 proper amount of energy is no longer due
 to laziness or incidence. It is merely and simply the result of a defective condition of the physical organism or of the gray | matter of the brain, and is distinctly and clearly attributable to ''malnutrition" or
 "the disease of fatigue" For-so say the, l present-day scientists and child students
 fatigue is not only the result but also the | cause of much of the poor work done by
 both children and adults at the present time, and is plainly and indubitaby a dis ease, and should be treated as such.
 
 Dr. Colin A. Scott of the Chicago normal school reached this conclusion, in company
 with many of his brother students of child
 life and conditions some time ago. Last
 year, in so far as his other scholastic duties
 allowed him. to do so, he made wide and varied tests among the school children of
 Chicago, with the idea of finding out just
 
 due fatigue affected the physical and men, tai condition of these children. The results
 of these tests and examinations were de- cidedly surprising, and went to prove that an almost overwhelming majority of the public school students of Chicago are doing
 poor work because of overwork, both on their own part and that of the teachers who instruct them At years of age, or when first entering school the average child was found to be perfectly noraml, and usually free from defective nervous conditions. From 6 until s years of age, however the percentage of these defective conditions increased slowly but steadily. At the age of s years, when many fresh studies are taken up and the mind of the child drawn in many new directions, the condition of nervous fatigue became much
 more general At the age of II for girls and 15 for boys, it again increased alarmingly, the result being the production of a state of cooperative illness, as it were. That is, the perpetual fatigue under which the chil- dren suffered produced defective nutrition and undue nervousness; these ailments, in turn, greatly encouraged and assisted the condition of overfatigue, which absolutely precuded the possibility of anything like good and forceful work or study.
 In Boston similar conclusions have been recently attained. too, both in regard to children and adults. Several famous nerv- ous specialists, both in New York and in European cities, have arrived at decisions of like character. The tired feeling which has served as the subject matter of
 so many jokes and comicalities, well as done duty as the outward express on of the inward and continued weariness which constitutes the terrible real but usually
 unspoken martyrdom of so many Amer
 can people of both sexes, has been duly
 and finally labeled a disease. When in
 a normal, healthy condition, so declare the physicians and scient sts who are now ad- vancing this theory, the average human being of whatever age feels like work" as witness the children who will work far harder over their play than even the
 sternest educator of the old-time type
 would have dreamed of compelling them to
 labor and the men and women who will dance hunt, or play golf for recreat on's sake with vim and energy never eXacted of the professional or commercial worker. When, therefore, a human being, a man, woman child, is perpetually languid, disinclned for labor or effort of any kind, afflicted with a chrome condition of morn ing tire"-to use the term formulated by Dr. Scott and his brother scientists-he, she or it is in poor nervous and nutritive condition, and suffer ng from the disease of fatigue. This is the basic theory upon which the new fatigue philosophy is founded.
 To the nonworlSing school girl or boy, whether suffering from overfatigue or nd b11t little ctioa1 acSiSt- ance or easing of the fatigue producing conditions will at present accrue from this theory, save as it's popularization may in duce individual instructors to modify or | avert these conditions or as the parents | may see fit to withdraw him or der from | school until the tired feeling has been l effectually banshed.
 | The school teacher or principal of Chicago | has no authority to decree an unrecognized | holiday for the overfatigued child, and this | is perhaps just as well for the cause of fu- l ture education and public culture. The "fa- | tigue tests" used in determining the nerv- | ous condition of such children are exceed | ingly simple, and quite within the power of an ordinary child to learn by heart after a | single experience of them. Were it possible | for the swaying arm or dropping shoulder | which effectually evidence the condition of | over-fatigue, to earn week or two of re- l spite from schoolroom labors the opening of | the skating and baseball seasons would | doubtless find many grammar school | students badly afflicted with the fatigue | disease, and the warm days of late spring. | time and early autumn would undoubtedly
 show a remarkable depletion of the school
 room ranks It is far easier, as well as less | acutely painful, to suffer from wearincss and lassitude than tooth or stomach ache, 1 for instance, and the symptoms of even the | severest case of fatigue-disease known are | exceedingly easy to stimulate Some chil-
 dren also although credited with possessing l Chicago grit and energy to an unusual de- | gree at other times, have been known to | suddenly assume them whenever requested | to go upon an errand or undertake bit of | household labor. In fact, so general and | widespread are fatigue symptoms of this | kind among children that even Dr. Scott ] would be puzzled occasionally to decide | which were real and which simulated or | acquired.
 | While if C an avfIl1 thinc to raoIi1a bo.,,