ding the "speeding-up" system in government plants, "speeding-up" was condemned as productive, among other effects, of accidents. In the Army and Navy Appropriation Bill, passed March 4, 1915, Congress inserted a provision prohibiting the employment of the "speeding-up" system in government plants.

A second conclusion is that, although personal fault may, in its aspects of ignorance, carelessness, and inexperience, account for a given number of accidents, yet it is a very minor, almost a negligible factor, as far as wilful misconduct is concerned. The returns show that deliberate recklessness or intoxication is not frequent as a cause of accidents, and in fact is so exceedingly slight as not to require serious consideration in the analysis of the immense number of accidents occurring in the United States annually.

This conclusion seems to be further borne out by the statistics in the federal report dealing with the cases under the United States Workmen's Compensation Act of 1908. Of 406 contested cases in four years (in the total number of accidents, the majority of the claims of which were allowed) negligence or misconduct was alleged in 80 cases, and in only one case was intoxication charged, and that charge was not substantiated by the courts.

A third conclusion is that the number of accidents is much greater than has been usually supposed. The reports of a number of the commissions refer to the fact that they do not by any means receive reports of all accidents, and that their lists are but partial. In addition, the process of covering accidents in agriculture has only just been begun. This, hitherto, has been an entirely neglected field, and to a large extent is still. From the scanty statistics at hand, it is not even possible to make a conjecture what the approximate total in agriculture is. Rural regions present an entirely different social environment from that of cities, yet accidents occur there as in industrial centers, on railroads, or in mines, although what the proportion is remains a problem.

ALCOHOL AS A FACTOR IN INDUSTRIAL ACCIDENTS

The British Association for the Advancement of Science has recently made an exceedingly important and lengthy study of "The Question of Fatigue from an Economic Standpoint." It includes a personal investigation in the United States by Mr. P. Sargent Florence, of Cambridge University, England. In the effort to determine the causal relations in accidents, the time element was given special attention.

By finding out at what period of the working spells accidents occur with greatest frequency and comparing them with output during the same period, it is possible to learn not only what part bodily fatigue plays in accidents but also the importance of other supposable causes, such as the abuse of liquor.

After a thorough discussion of the reliability of the figures indicating the time distribution of accidents and the proportionate distribution of output, the report has the following to say on the subject of drink as a cause of industrial accidents, which is a complete refutation of accepted opinions on the subject or of opinions that are industriously circulated for a special purpose:

"In fact our figures agree with one another to such an extent, particularly those of accidents, that we are justified in speaking of a 'normal' time-distribution of output and of accidents, or considered inversely, accident-immunity. The shape of the output and accident-immunity curves for a five-hour spell may for purposes of illustration be summarized as follows:

* Where there are only four hours in the spell, strike out the last output, but the fourth accident, hour.

"In seeking an explanation of this 'normal' time-distribution of the accident rate and the output in a spell of manufacturing work, let us concentrate on the illustrative table. Here we find four similar degrees: very great, great, fair and small, succeeding one another in both the output and the accident-immunity column, though earlier in the spell with accidents than with output. Now both output and accident immunity vary inversely to fatigue; these four decreasing degrees, therefore, may well be measuring an increase in fatigue.

"The only other possible cause that could by itself explain the rise in the accidents, at any rate, during the morning and afternoon, is the drinking of alcohol before starting the spell. This explanation has been advanced by the Temperance Scientific Federation of Boston, and taken up by certain employers. To prove this contention, however, it would have to be shown firstly that the most debilitating effect of alcohol on control occurs just about four hours after its drinking, and not earlier or later, and secondly that such alcohol drinking is a regular habit among the workers.

"The first point is far from established either scientifically or from everyday-but not necessarily personal-experience. All that we can say for certain is that if alcohol is taken at all in large quantities, the attention and muscular control that avoids accidents is lost immediately, and in the first hour.

"The second point can certainly not be established at all in some of our records. The women cotton-spinners, the picked men workers at Hans Renolds', at the Cadillac Company, at the National Cash Register Company, and the girls at Jacob's and Cadbury's and the Denison Manufacturing Company are all certainly not drinkers, yet all of them show the same accident 'curve' as other and possibly hard-drinking employes.

"If it be only fatigue, then, that can explain the middle hours, what of the first hour of output and the fifth hour of accident immunity that are left over? Here the explanation must be different in each case, and such a difference may well be, since variations in accidents and output are not always measuring the same psychophysical activities. It is now contended that the small output in the first hour is due to 'practice' and that the fair accident immunity in the fifth or last hour is due to anticipatory 'excitement,'

both pulling in an opposite direction to fatigue, and here more than overcoming the fatigue effects; that this excitement does not affect the output at the end of the spell, and that, contrary to all expectation, this practice does not affect the accidents at the beginning of the spell. This contention, founded on the facts in the tables below, is backed by the somewhat theoretical suggestions of Section III. There it was advanced that the main psycho-physical activity directly measured by output-rate variations was the changing of speed, and, by Weber's very definition, practice is a removal of pressure from the central nervous organ manifested in an increase of facility, rapidity, certainty, and regularity. On the other hand, that the main psycho-physical activities specially measured by accident-rate variations were attention and muscular control, and on these activities of the central nervous system a 'psychomotor state' of excitement would presumably be far more potent than one like practice, that is removing pressure from the nervous

centres.

"Now, if this explanation of the agreements and disagreements in the ascertained time-distribution of accidents and output respectively be correct, the following would be the psycho-physical diagnosis of a spell of factory work considered chronologically.

"First hour: Fingers, arms, body and mind after their rest are working slow, but sure. To increase the pace and even perhaps to concentrate attention is uphill work and a fight against subjective feelings of sloth. In an emergency, however, muscles could be perfectly controlled.

"Second hour: Body and mind getting into their stride again, are working very fast, but not perhaps so exactly. Feelings of sloth are conquered, but there is a terrible long prospect of work ahead. However, as work is running easily, the mind may think of pleasanter things: attention scatters.

"Third or third and fourth hour: Body and mind running on, but attention lost. If any sudden danger threatens or emergency arises, it may not be quick enough perceived, and when perceived, muscles may not be quick enough to prevent an accident; they can continue rhythmically and automatically at the same work, but for any change of movements that may be suddenly called, there is insufficient control,

"Last hour (fourth or fifth): Body no longer running automatically with the same ease, an effort of the will required (a spurt) to keep speed up; but the end is ahead, with food and rest; the attention awakes and control over the muscles is braced updanger is better perceived and more quickly avoided. At the very end, however, even this new attention and control may tire, as indeed the whole body is tired, and only a rest can bring recovery."