Fever Chart

It has been said that the mark of a good editorial policy is that it will admit its mistakes; that's what we're going to do now, if only to get into the big leagues. The policy of this paper, so invariably sound, fell prey to an error that has on occasion snared such august journals as the New York Times or the Yale Daily News; it became a false Cassandra.

In other chaotic days, on January 27, 1947 to be precise, the editorial stated bluntly that the world stood "on the threshold of another disastrous flu pandemic," adding with grim fortitude that "the storm signals are flying." And though it is galling to do so, admitted it must be that now, a year later, Harvard is healthier than ever. The editorial decried "pointing with pride at the empty beds in Stillman," but today let us point at them with pride, and commiserate only those suffering from an overdose of benzedrine.

This year the Hygiene Department reports a lower number of exam-time casualties than it can over remember. Flu is almost absent, and though the danger of an epidemic or a pandemic is always there, that is hardly the point. It seems that for some reason Stillman always has its greatest influx of customers during the last couple of weeks in January. Some of the unfortunate take too much benzedrine, others find the Infirmary the safest place to be during a final, but a larger number are real victims of the psychological pressure of examinations.

The conclusion must be that the undergraduate takes the horrors of examinations period more in stride nowadays, and that the haggard faces around the Yard conceal nerves that are steely. Perhaps the empty Stillman beds are indicative not of the lull before a storm, but of a basic undergraduate sturdiness, which now seems to be not entirely due to the predominance of older men.