Yet the maintenance of one's good spirits and optimism is an essential part of the treatment.

And it was in this work that Page now proved an indispensable aid to the medical men.

As soon as Dr.Alderman found himself stretched out, a weak and isolated figure, cut off from those activities and interests which had been his inspiration for forty years, with no companions except his own thoughts and a few sufferers like himself, letters began to arrive with weekly regularity from the man whom he always refers to as "dear old Page." The gayety and optimism of these letters, the lively comments which they passed upon men and things, and their wholesome and genial philosophy, were largely instrumental, Dr.Alderman has always believed, in his recovery.

Their effect was so instant and beneficial that the physicians asked to have them read to the other patients, who also derived abounding comfort and joy from them.

The whole episode was one of the most beautiful in Page's life, and brings out again that gift for friendship which was perhaps his finest quality.