Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1902-07-28
Fighting Life III Philippines.

ira amount OF care and attention.
Yet this condition, this chronic home
sickness, is one of the most danger
Gus disorders which we have to treat
1t represents the solution from which
may crystalline insanity. 1t is the
more dangerous in that it is often I'M
suspected, and will smolder along
until it finally bursts into a flame of
suicidal, or homicidal, mania. 1t ac-
counts for more dementia than sun
or fever.
Tom, Dick and Harry see cases of
this kind before they have been long
lin the. islands.
When a man is herded with body
of other men for awhile, he begins, to
certain extent, to lose his individu-
atty. He ceases to be governed by
his former code of ethics. There is
nothing around him to remind him
that he is himself. His principles
unconsciously adjust themselves to
surrounding conditions and circum-
stances. What young Mr.. Brown of
Greenfield, H., might have done if
offered an indignity by anyone has
nothing to do with what Sergeant
Brown,-the United States Infantry,
might do if, when half-sick and thor
oughly disguised at the end of a long
days march, he is fired on by ma
tive from nipa hut.
Soldier Becomes Mailman.
One day while on guard duty a
second sergeant of one Of the COM
panies was suddenly seized with an
acute dementia. The worst feature
of his case lay in the fact that at the
time his belt was full of ammunition,
and his Krag- Jorgenson was in his
hands. He had strayed few yards
from the outposts shack when sud-
denly and without the slightest warn
ing he threw UP his piece and open
ed a hot though deliberate fire upon
his comrades. The others, recogniZ-
ing the situation, promptly took to
cover. The cover was full of Fill
pinos, but that was an unimportant
item; the Filipinos were poor shots,
the sergeant known to be a fine one.
Seeing no one in sight, the mad
man started for the enemy's trenches
at slow run, and as he ran he howl
led. The last that was seen of him
was as he disappeared in an inter-
vening clump of bamboos. Two days
later he returned unframed, with but
| five rounds left in his belt. The
dementia had passed, leaving him
confused and trif1e depressed. Why
he was not killed was never definite
ly learned. His comrades told the
surgeon that for several weeks he
had been moody and uncommunica-
ed that unless they went ON a hike"
before long he would lose his mind.
His diagnosis was entered in the hos
pital records as "acute mania" and
there being no return of the disorder,
tive. Once or twice he had remark
Often when on outpost duty through
able to follow the cause and effect
| covered"
Quantities of such cases might be
cited, all going to prove conclusively
that under certain unaccustomed
conditions it is possible for men to
to all prehabitual impulse as the re
suit of unusual influences upon
which they have no gauge This
would, of course, only apply to those
| whose lives have formerly run in
not know the meaning of the word
psychology" dissertation on nerv-
GUS physiology would be lost upon
them; nevertheless they are clearly
he was in due time recorded as ere
| night, they have felt the gnawlng
though they would not have described
pain of heartaching inconsistencies,
the long, soft, mysterious tropic
it as such, so faint and dim has the
thought of home become One by
| these things with sympathy. Al
though they have never run off their
own track, they are able to under
stand how it would feel They do
more or less of a groove or track, and
usually upon scheduled time When
a machine of this sort gets derailed
the wheels continue to revolve, and
the result is apt to be disastrous to
surrounding objects as we'll as to the
machine.
Know Not Psychology.
Tom, Dick and Harry observe
one their letters have ceased to ar
rive. The last transport brought no
tidings, and at their lack the cold
chill of disappointment has proved
as hardening as pail of water on
glowing steel. They have long since
ceased to look upon friendly natives
with kindly liberation; no longer
do they play with the brown babies
and chat with the soft-eyed mothers
in the market-place. They have
found comrades who had grown to
trust these furtive islanders, cold and
stark, hacked and dismembered, in
the bananas. They ponder among
themselves and decide that the only
chance of pacifcation lies in a whole
some cataclysm: an inundation of
human blood that will purge the
islands of treacherv.