play. Had he been living right, he could have multiplied his
efficiency three-fold and been the better for the larger doing. His
wife felt he must "rest," and so did the family doctor; he himself was
practically past arguing or disagreeing.

But the rest-cure which the neurologist prescribed was certainly
unique. It may have been wrongly named. Mr. van der Veere was a man of
unusually strong physique. Nature had equipped him with a muscular
system better than nine-tenths of his fellowmen possess, but he had
never utilized it. For many generations his forbears had wrung food
and life and, unconsciously, health from the soil. He was three
generations from touch with mother earth, and back to the soil he was
sent. He was taught to work increasing hours of common, manual labor.
For weeks he did his part of the necessary drudgery of the world. He
shoveled coal, he spaded in the garden, he worked on the public roads,
he transplanted trees, he hoed common weeds with a common hoe, he
tramped, he toiled and he sweat. The need for physical labor was in
his blood. He needed his share of it, as do we all. And his blood
answered exultantly, as good blood always does, to the call of honest
toil. Within a month he realized a keenness for the work of the day.
His fine muscles took on hardness, they seemed to double in size, and
strength came, and with it not only a willingness but an eagerness
which transformed that strength into productive effort. With the
willingness to do what his hands found to do came sleep, for his
nerves--bred as they had been in good stock--rejoiced when they found
him living as they had for years begged him to live. A fifteen-year-
old appetite came to the fifty-five-year-old man, and transformation
wrought happy changes in his face and bearing. Indecision faded,
introspection disappeared, and a decision came which was to forever
put indecision out of his way. A decision which brought the peace and