One would naturally think that the dreams of soldiers would be concerned with warfare. This is true in many cases, especially during the first few weeks or months of actual combat. No matter how brave and patriotic a person may be, fear is almost certain to take possession of him when he first faces the enemy, or hears the detonations produced by the instruments of warfare, and witnesses the carnage resulting from warfare. Since fears may instigate dreams, it follows that the fears of the terrified soldier, though the fears may be hidden from the outside world, tend to colour his dreams. Much depends upon the individual peculiarities of the soldier, or sailor, as the case may be; for example, probably most of the submarine commanders were not disturbed in their dreams by the havoc they wrought. One submarine officer, however, who had fired many torpedoes which made "hits," but who had not cared to see the effects of his marksmanship, one day decided to see what his torpedo accomplished. He saw men, women, and children in the water; mothers, clasping their babes, going down with the ship, etc. The scene filled him with sorrow, so much so that he was disturbed by night and by day; he was taken prisoner soon afterwards, and was glad of it.

There are some soldiers who never dream of battle, and who are able to sleep peacefully, and dream pleas-urably when all is tumult about them. A certain type of soldier - the impressionable, the sensitive, who adapts himself with difficulty, or not at all, to new conditions, who has a tendency to be neurotic - is especially prone to insomnia and war dreams. In his dreams he is distressed by the horrors he has witnessed; he relives the engagements in which he participated; he is pursued or about to be killed by the enemy. This is also the soldier who contributes to the number of so-called shell shock cases. The term "shell shock" is an unfortunate one, for it carries with it the idea that shells have caused in some way the various troubles, as mutism, certain forms of paralysis, blindness, tremblings, crying spells, etc., often found in "shell shock." When one considers that these symptoms occur most frequently during the first few months of the individuals' participation in the conflict; that they occur far behind the front, as in base hospitals, and in cantonments, it can be seen that they are not dependent, per se, upon the influence of gassing, injury by bayonets, shrapnel, etc., or from atmospheric changes produced by the detonations of shells. As a matter of fact, few cases of ' 'shell shock" show any essential differences from the neuroses met with in civil life. Doubtless the war may aggravate the neuroses of soldiers, and may tend to elicit them in susceptible individuals, but any trying circumstance in civil life would be as potent. When a man is by nature a prey of phobias; easily influenced by his own suggestions or those of others; unable to get on with his fellows, or to be happy under the conditions warfare imposes upon him; troubled by discomfiting news from home, etc., it is comparatively easy for him to develop various nervous troubles; this is especially true if he witnesses some horrible injuries or deaths, or is worn out by fatigue, lack of food, or sleep. In short, so-called shell shock cases are in most instances similar to the neuroses the physician meets with every day; they are dependent upon emotional or mental causes, rather than physical ills or destruction of tissue.

The late war has naturally afforded many opportunities for the study of soldiers' dreams.1 Among the best articles on this subject, as far as the writer is aware, is Sir F. Mott's second paper2 on the War Psycho-Neurosis. Almost without exception the soldiers and officers who were asked to write their recurrent dreams stated that they usually dreamt of their war experiences.

1 Hereward Carrington has dealt with the so-called supernormal dreams in Psychical Phenomena and the War, 1918, Dodd, Mead & Co.

2 The Psychology of Soldiers' Dreams, Lancet, London, Feb. 2, 1918.

The dreams were generally visual and auditory, - of shells exploding, machine guns firing, etc., which were seen and heard. A common dream was of being in an aeroplane, bombing or fighting; the machine is hit; there is a descent in a burning plane. These dreams occurred in those who were not members of the Royal Flying Corps, and in those who did not have these experiences actually; however, the men had heard about this being the fate of others, and had thought it might happen to them. Should a soldier, or officer, dream that he had a successful encounter with the enemy, he was cheerful during the next day; if the dream was distressing, he was melancholy. In speaking of the awaken-ing of ideas of past war experiences in sleep Dr. Mott says: "For besides those cases which wake up in a fright and cold sweat, there have been numerous instances of soldiers who have walked in their sleep and many others have talked, shouted out orders, and cried out in alarm, as if again engaged in battle; some of these have been mutes.1 But the strangest phenomena of forgotten dreams of soldiers suffering with shell shock are observed in those who in their sleep act as though they were back in the trenches engaged in battle; and go through all the pantomime of fighting with bomb, with -bayonet, with machine gun and with rifle, and yet remember nothing of these happenings when they awaken."

Dr. George W. Crile says in his book 2:

"The sleep of the exhausted soldier has but one discordant note, and that is the dream of battle. The dream is always the same, always of the enemy. It is never a pleasant pastoral dream, or a dream of home, but a dream of the charge, of the bursting shell, of the bayonet thrust! Again and again in camp and in hospital wards, in spite of the great desire to sleep, a desire so great that the dressing of a compound fracture would not be felt, men sprang up with a battle cry, and reached for their rifles, the dream outcry startling their comrades, whose thresholds were excessively low to the stimuli of attack.

1 Mutism due to emotion, not organic disease.

2 A Mechanistic View of War and Peace, 1916, pp. 27-28, The Macmillan Co.

"In the hospital wards, battle nightmares were common, and severely wounded men would often spring out of their beds. An unexpected analogy to this battle nightmare was found in the anesthetic dreams. Precisely the same battle nightmare, that occurred in sleep, occurred when soldiers were going under or coming out of anesthesia, when they would often struggle valiantly, - for the anesthetic dream related not to a home scene, not to some dominating activation of peaceful days, but always to the enemy, and usually to a surprise attack.

"One day a French soldier, in the first stage of anesthesia, broke the stillness of the operating room, transfixing every one, while in low, beautiful tones, and with intense feeling, he sang the Marseillaise."