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PRACTICAL experience of the war shows that the degree to which a soldier can recover is in a large measure a question of his state of mind; and his state of mind is usually a reflection of the state of mind of his wife or his mother. Women have always known in a general way that mental attitude has much to do with a patient's recovery in ordinary illness. Now we see that the same thing is true of the man who has contracted tuberculosis, has been blinded, has lost an arm or a leg, or is suffering from any of the physical or mental diseases that war leaves in its wake. The hope of his future lies in making him believe he has a future. His return to useful activity depends on his own conviction that he can be useful. The instant he is content to be an invalid he will become and remain an invalid.

To prevent his losing hope, to keep up his sense of responsibility is in the power of his womankind. That is why it is necessary that every woman who has a man on the other side should understand what the government is trying to do for him, why it is doing it, and how she can help.

First of all she ought to know that each man's pension will be continued however little or much he progresses on the road to health and self-support. The government does this not only from a sense of justice, but because, knowing that recovery is largely a mental state, it realizes that it would be setting up an obstacle, if it should penalize a man for recovering by taking away or even decreasing his pension.

Then, women should see that the government is doing this for the sake of the wounded men themselves. Protection of the health of soldiers while they are part of the fighting force, is for the sake of the army. But this re-education of wounded men for civil life is done in the interest of the individual. In past times, governments have found it cheaper to entomb such men in institutions for incurables and in soldiers' homes -- to pay them their pensions and forget about them. The present idea is that the country owes them more than their pensions; it owes them the fullest possible return to a normal life.

But in order to return them to normal life it will be necessary to retain control of them beyond the military hospital. There must first come bedside treatment, of course -- the direct medical or surgical treatment for the disease or wound; then the special treatment necessary to fit him for his selected occupation; then, outside the hospital, his training in a vocational school; and then at last his entrance upon his industrial job.

In every step the help of women is essential; n:jt only in cheering him during the first stages, but in encouraging him to follow patiently and exactly the detail of his training -- a routine more wearisome to many natures than fighting.

Our government asks that we use our love to strengthen the will of our wounded -- not to weaken it. This may sound like a harsh thing to say to a woman who has sent out a strong healthy man and receives him back blinded or crippled, until we remember that the object of it is to save the soldier and to keep alive in him the courage that was by no means all expended at the front.

The shock to the man who wakes up after the operation to find that he has lost an arm or a leg is not only the shock of his own handicap, but the horror of being a dependent -- something useless and abnormal. Too much sympathy of the wrong kind intensifies this feeling, instead of decreasing it. And as a matter of fact, it isn't true; with the help of modern science, the handicapped man can still attain a high degree of usefulness and activity.

The recovery of our disabled soldiers -- their return to a useful life -- is in the control of the women of this country. No war work that has ever been offered to us is as important -- or perhaps as difficult.

But it can be done only with the help of women -- only if wives and mothers and sisters will give as much pride and self-sacrifice to the return of their men to civil life as they gave to sending them away to the colors.