OF THE NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL 107 



that with the passing of the present crisis, so few military 

 officers are capable of carrying on the mental researches. I 

 fear that some other nation may take up the mental analyses 

 where we left them when the emergency ceased, and may de- 

 velop a real military psychology that will be more deadly 

 than 42 cm. guns. Our efforts, however excellent and how- 

 ever valuable, are only the first crude beginnings of such a 

 military psychology. 



"In reviewing my war work correspondence, it is inter- 

 esting and instructive to note that while the practicable 

 means of attack was often delayed for months, and the prac- 

 tical occasion for developing the problem was often quite un- 

 connected with the inquiry from the Research Council, every 

 one of my leads for service came first from the Research 

 Council. Furthermore, in spite of some moments of personal 

 discouragement and misgiving, not one of the inquiries that 

 came to me in this way proved either useless or impracticable. 

 It seems to me that this is a very high tribute to the wisdom 

 of the guidance of our chairman and his colleagues of the Re- 

 search Council. The only serious difficulty in the path of 

 scientific service was the initial lack of confidence of the au- 

 thorities. When confidence was once established, their faith 

 in our ability to turn the desired tricks became an embar- 

 rassment, and the only limit to service was the limit of human 

 endurance. 



"The months that I devoted exclusively to national ser- 

 vice seem in retrospect a kind of scientific excursion. The 

 shadow of sorrow at their close comes from the fact that with 

 the rotation of military service the old chiefs for whom we 

 worked and would have followed to the death If necessary are 

 being replaced by strangers who know nothing of our limita- 

 tions nor our scientific potentialities. 



"Shortly after the Committee on Psychology was organ- 

 ized, Chairman Yerkes referred to me as an inquiry from Dr. 

 Mendenhall of the National Research Council the question 

 whether we could recommend tests to select gun-pointers for 

 merchantmen. The records of our efforts to answer that in- 

 quiry and of the vastly greater efforts to get our answer across 



