ties where transportation by rail or automobile is a matter of several days' time at present, and where the use of the airplane would make it a matter of a few hours.

According to my best advices, military authorities agree that the day of the "fixed gun" is passed-that is to say, a piece of artillery, no matter how well protected by fortifications, is certain of destruction if the enemy has once accurately determined its position. It is probable that our coast defences, which are the fixed type, will be so modified that, by means of special railways running parallel to the coast, the big guns, which at present defend only the immediate vicinity of our harbors, can be made mobile and used for the purpose that their name indicates, namely, coast defence. Our aviators should be trained in coast patrol work. They should become familiar with the vicinities in which they would be likely to operate. They should conduct manœuvres in connection with our artillery and our submarines. Permanent coast patrol stations are required, not only on this Continent and in the Panama Canal Zone, but also in our island possessions. The co-operation in defense work between our airplanes and submarines still remains to be worked out. One of the most advanced problems of coast defence, but one which is capable of solution, is the control of a submarine torpedo from an airplane by the use of wireless appliances.

Through the shortsighted policy of our Government, the officers of our Army and Navy have not been given sufficient opportunity to secure technical training. In individual cases this has been possible, but only in an elementary way. At the beginning of the war the fact was well recognized in this country that the American aeronautical engineers were not equal in training and experience to those of our Alliesprincipally England, France and Italy-nor those of Germany. This is no reflection on the Americans, because in the past eighteen months they have undoubtedly caught up and today are little if any behind in matters of practical design or construction. With but little governmental assistance, private individuals and the airplane companies that have been for some time engaged in the manufacture of airplanes, have developed highly satisfactory types, but these planes are only now approaching a point where they could be utilized by our Government. The Government has not availed itself of the services of these men as it should have done; but it is not the purpose of this article to discuss

the reasons why. It is to be hoped, however, that the men in question will now be given an opportunity by the Government to study at first hand the wonderful progress in aviation that has been made in European countries during the past four years. These men should be sent to Europe at Government expense, and educated fully in the design and construction of airplanes, including their motors and accessories. The Army has developed, particularly among the younger officers, many men who have demonstrated their ability as aeronautical engineers, and these men have not had a fair chance to show what they can do. Since we entered the war, they have in small numbers been offered opportunities for study by the Allied Governments, and it remains only to give them the opportunity to continue their investigations and experiments to secure for our Army the nucleus of a wonderful organization.

I have no sympathy with the theory that has been advanced as the reason for not utilizing the services of these men to better advantage, namely, that they lacked ability and experience. This was not their fault, nor is there any reason to believe that, if placed on an equality with the European engineers, they would not have produced just as good, if not better, designs and types of aircraft than our European friends. A rich nation like ours can afford to expend for purposes of national defence vast sums of money in research and experimental work, which no private individual could hope to equal, and in times past our representatives in Washington who reflected the attitude of their constituents have been unwilling to grant the necessary appropriations. Only a national emergency, like that of the great war, was sufficient to loosen the purse strings, and this was done too late to have much effect in the present war.

The Senate and the Hughes investigations of aircraft production have undoubtedly developed many unsavory examples of mismanagement and abuse of power. In spite of this, had the war lasted until next March, the United States would have been equipped with an aerial fleet that would have been sufficient to crush the Central Powers without assistance from any of our Allies. We have skilled aviators by the thousand and the necessary complement of mechanics. We are in a position to produce such vast quantities of efficient airplanes and motors during the coming winter that we could entirely have overcome the enemy.

Now that the war is over, the Government, naturally, will cancel many contracts for the production of aircraft and motors, and it is right that it should do this. There is no commercial demand for such a vast number of machines. But if the airplane industry is not supported by Government expenditures, it will disappear as quickly as it has appeared. The great majority of factories working on airplane material have been adapted for airplane purposes by converting plants producing commercial articles somewhat similar in nature. These factories will, of course, get back to their own line of endeavor. On the other hand, there are many factories that have been especially built, or which, prior to the war, were designed and equipped exclusively for the manufacture of aircraft, and are not in any way suitable for others purposes. In such factories Government contracts should be placed sufficient to enable them to remain in operation.

The experimental work must be continued if we are to remain in a position to defend ourselves. The possibility of a world-wide disarmament is an extremely vague hope. If we are to have a military establishment it must be of the best, and those elements of defence that require the greatest advance preparation must receive the first consideration. Aeronautics certainly falls within this class. The aircraft investigation will undoubtedly be pushed to a definite conclusion and not left in its present status. The public are not satisfied. They demand to know more regarding the manner in which the war was conducted, and doubtless they will have this wish gratified.

From the beginning of the war, until now, there has not been a single man on the Aircraft Board who had any previous practical training in aeronautics. The men who have held the reins of power have been automobile men, bankers, and army officers selected solely for their executive ability. Is it possible that during the past ten years of experiment we have not developed in this country a single man who has the combined technical knowledge and executive ability at least to entitle him to a place on an Aircraft Board composed of seven members?

Let us try to build up; not tear down. Our country should be what some one in the French Army, in reference to aircraft, so aptly described as "Under the Protecting Wings." EARLE REMINGTON.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF THE RED CROSS

MOVEMENT

BY H. ADDINGTON BRUCE

FEW phases of the Great War are more significant from a psychological or sociological point of view than the sudden blossoming of the American Red Cross into a national organization of stupendous magnitude. Three years ago the Red Cross had a membership of only twenty-two thousand. Today it has twenty-three million members, and, as I write, it is about to begin a "drive" expected to double, and more than double, its present enrollment. According to an official estimate recently given mc, five million people are now working in Red Cross establishments on both sides of the Atlantic, and perhaps fifteen million more are assisting at their homes in Red Cross activities. Besides all of which, the American people have contributed upwards of three hundred million dollars to the support of the Red Cross since the United States became a participant in the war. Here, assuredly, is a remarkable social phenomenon that raises an interesting problem-the problem of explaining adequately this marvellous response to the Red Cross appeal, and of evaluating its significance correctly.

One solution, of course, that lies ready at hand is to see in it an unusually impressive instance of the power of "suggestion" and "psychic contagion." On this theory, in order to understand the amazing spread of the Red Cross movement it would only be necessary to postulate the persuasiveness of an exceptionally well organized propaganda, acting on the imitative tendency common to mankind. And suggestion was undeniably the immediate dynamic factor. But this leaves untouched the deeper problem of the peculiar effectiveness of suggestion in this particular case. Why did the suggestion to give and to toil for the Red Cross "take," and

why did it take so hard? Responsivity to a suggested idea does not depend solely on the skill with which that idea is suggested, though many people seem to think that it does.

Suggestion, in fact, is popularly regarded as an almost magic force, of irresistible potency when rightly applied. Actually there must always be present, on the part of the suggestee, an ardent, however subconscious, desire to respond to a given suggestion. Otherwise suggestion, no matter how deft its presentation, will beat forever against a stone wall of negativism. This, incidentally, explains why suggestion often fails in the treatment of functional nervous and mental maladies, a field of action in which as a rule it is notably efficacious. When, as frequently happens, nervous or mental symptoms give their victim certain advantages-such as being a centre of sympathetic interest and attention—which would be lost if relief from the symptoms were gained, a subconscious desire to cling to them may prove altogether too strong for suggestion to overcome. When, on the other hand, a favoring desire is present and dominant, no great skill in the applying of suggestion is required to secure the end in view. In the present instance, obviously, the suggested idea, "Give to the Red Cross, work for the Red Cross, sacrifice for the Red Cross," must have accorded with deepseated and intense desires. If this had not been the case the systematized campaigns of suggestion in behalf of the Red Cross could never have been so abundantly fruitful.

As the figures cited indicate, all classes of American society have responded, with money and personal service. Men of the highest ability in professional and business life have volunteered without pay to direct the workings of the Red Cross organization. Women of wealth and social prestige, hitherto leading sheltered and perhaps not altogether profitable lives, have in the service of the Red Cross labored without thought of self, displaying powers of endurance which none suspected in them. Many, indeed, have left homes of luxury, cheerfully to undergo privation, to risk, and not infrequently to lay down, life itself. And when undivided service could not be given to the Red Cross, hundreds of thousands of people have willingly superimposed Red Cross work on the routine tasks of their regular occupations. After a day of strenuous effort, business men, housewives, clerks, shopgirls, factory workers, men and women in every walk of life, have devoted their precious evening hours to labor for