In those days any holiday from London would have been acceptable. Most of those who passed their time in government offices were overworked; almost all of them _ex hypothesi_ were in one way or another unfit; all were stale. Their blood unfired by hand-to-hand fighting, they became unconscious victims of despondency which bore no accurate relation to the fluctuating fortune of war. While it is probably true that in the winter before America entered the war, when the reservoir of men was running dry, when food had first to be rationed and England was threatened with the "unrestricted" submarine campaign, there was better reason for depression than in September 1914 or March 1918, when the danger was past before it had been fully realised, it is also true that depression continued when improving news from the front should have relieved it. There is a close connection between a temporarily weakening morale and the first decline in the standard of living: by the end of 1916 food was deteriorating in quality and quantity; digestion and nerves were affected; bodily vitality became impaired. There is a connection no less close between mental vitality and light; an ill-lit room produces low spirits, and London was ill-lit after the first threat of an air-raid. Further, the health of mind and of body is dependent on sleep; and, if a civilian may criticise the strategy of the German air-service, it may be suggested that it would have done better to aim at breaking British morale by keeping Britain awake at night. The material achievement of the raiders must have been disappointing to the German general staff: the destruction of life was insignificant; the damage to property trifling; it may be doubted whether the bombs dropped on railways, munition works and public buildings retarded the pace of the war by an hour; there was no widespread panic; the civilian population was never driven to sue prematurely for peace, the seat of government was never transferred. To this extent the air-raids were a failure.