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 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
PEN-PICTURES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 GREAT PUBLIC SCHOOLS OF ENGLAND, 
 
 SKETCHES AND STORIES OF FAMOOS SCHOLARS, 
 HENRY Frederic' REDDALL, 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 From the Golden Gate to the Golden Kokn," ''Who Was He?" etc. 
 
 .9^ 
 
 OF 
 
 CO/V<J;^ 
 
 ^^ -OPYRIGHT" 
 
 
 i\^i5"/^ YORK: PHILLIPS &- HUNT. 
 
 CINCINNA TI : CRANSTON <£t= ST OWE. 
 
 1888. 
 
Copyright, iSSS, by 
 F'HILLIF'S &• MUNT, 
 
 New York. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Frontispiece 3 
 
 Introductory Sketch 7 
 
 Winchester College 19 
 
 Eton College 49 
 
 St. Paul's School 97 
 
 Shrewsbury Grammar School 109 
 
 Christ Hospital 123 
 
 Westminster School 163 
 
 Merchant Taylors' School 185 
 
 Rugby School 195 
 
 Harrow School 219 
 
 Charterhouse School 249 
 
INTRODUCTORY SKETCH, 
 
 CERTAIN witty author once 
 rather cleverly dedicated a preface 
 "to the man who reads it." The 
 present writer would much prefer 
 to have no introduction, especially 
 in a book intended to interest young folks. 
 However, there is always this alternative 
 for those who, like a little friend of mine, 
 " hate a preface," — it may be skipped. But in the 
 present instance there are some things to be said 
 which must be said here or not at all, and those who 
 honor me by beginning " at the very beginning " may 
 console themselves with this crumb of comfort — that 
 I have tried to put all the dull things in the book 
 into this introductory sketch. 
 
 To be a " public-school boy " in England means 
 sometliing totally different from the idea conveyed 
 
8 Introductory Sketch. 
 
 bj tlie same phrase in our own country. There, 
 " board schools " provide an education for the chil- 
 dren of the masses, and correspond to our system of 
 public schools. For those youngsters whose parents 
 prefer them, and are able to afford the expense, 
 there are numberless private boarding-schools of all 
 grades of excellence and of none at all, as is the case in 
 the United States. But in England the term " public 
 school " refers exclusively to ten richly endowed and 
 very ancient seminaries for boys which have no coun- 
 terpart either in our own land or on the Continent of 
 Europe. They are in theory free to all, though as a 
 matter of fact only the sons of the upper middle 
 class and of the nobility and gentry attend them. 
 All of these schools have been for centuries the 
 nurseries of Englishmen, the fame and prowess of 
 many of whom have • astonished the world. Nearly 
 every man of note, in war and in peace, in the Church 
 and in the forum, at the bar and in the field of let- 
 ters, began his career at some one of these schools. 
 Theirs are the scenes amid which England's greatest 
 men fought their mimic battles ; their annals are re- 
 plete with stories of thrilling interest to the boys and 
 
Intkoductory Sketch. 9 
 
 girls of the English-speaking race every- where ; and 
 the great public schools are as much a part of the 
 nation's life as the twin universities of Oxford and 
 Cambridge, to which they are in reality the stepping- 
 stones. 
 
 Some of these schools, while affording free shelter, 
 subsistence, and a classical education to certain bene- 
 ficiaries, are attended by a far larger number of boys 
 who pay handsomely for the instruction received, as 
 in the case of the "Oppidans" of Eton College, wlio, 
 as the name implies, live in the town while pursuing 
 their studies at the school. To this class belong 
 Rugby, Harrow, Eton, Westminster, and Winches- 
 ter schools. On the other hand. Charterhouse, St. 
 Paul's School, Merchant Taylors', and Christ Hos- 
 pital are purely benevolent institutions, wdiereat the 
 tuition furnished is equal to that of any of the sister- 
 hood of schools, though the benefits bestowed are by 
 no means regarded as charitable. Tliey are sup- 
 ported by ancient endowments from the crown or 
 from wealthy citizens, or by incomes derived from 
 rents and other investments. 
 
 There are several smaller schools, as Bedford Gram- 
 
10 Introductory Sketch. 
 
 mar School, founded 1552; Clieltenlia!n School; City 
 of London School; Diilwich College ; King Edward's 
 School, Birmingham, founded 1552 ; Manchester 
 Free Grammar School, founded in 1515 ; Marl- 
 iDorough College ; Repton Grammar School ; Sher- 
 borne Grammar School, founded 1550; Tunbridge 
 Grammar School, founded 1552 ; Uppingham School, 
 founded 1584; Wellington College; Boteler Gram- 
 mar School, founded 1526 ; Kmg Edward's School 
 (1553), Bromsgrove, Worcestershire; Durham Gram- 
 mar School (1541), King Edward VI.'s School (1542), 
 Great Berkhamsted ; King's School, Canterbury ; 
 Leammgton Proprietary College ; King Edw^ard 
 VI.'s School (1547), Norwich; Queen Elizabeth's 
 S(;hool, Ipswich ; Radley College, near Abingdon ; 
 Richmond School (1567), Yorkshire ; the Royal 
 Naval School (1833), at New Cross, Kent; St. 
 Andrew's College (1853), at Bradfield, near Read- 
 ing; and the Stationers' School (1858); but these, 
 although equally ancient and honorable, are not 
 usually classed among the great public founda- 
 tions. 
 
 Seeing: that reference has been made to tlie extreme 
 
Introductory Sketch. 11 
 
 antiquity of the ten great public schools, it may not 
 be amiss to give the precise date of the founding and 
 the name of the founder of each : Wnichester, the 
 oldest, was established by William of Wykeham in 
 1382 ; Eton by William Waynflete, under the patron- 
 age of Henry YI., in 1440 ; Merchant Taylors' School, 
 1551; St. Paul's School in 1512; Christ Hospital 
 (the far-famed " Blue-coat School ") also by Edward 
 YI. in 1553; Westminster by Queen Elizabeth in 
 1560; Shrewsbui-y Grammar School, 1562; Rugby 
 by Lawrence Sheriffe, a London merchant, in 1567 ; 
 Harrow by John Lyon, a wealthy yeoman, in 1571 ; 
 and the Charterhouse by Thomas Sutton, another of 
 London's generous citizens, in 1611. * So that 
 Winchester, the oldest, boasts a hoary age of over 
 ^Ye centuries; while the youngest of the family, 
 the Charterhouse School, is nearly three centuries 
 old, having been established during Shakespeare's 
 time, shortly after the accession of the first Stuart 
 king of England, and more than ten years before the 
 founding of Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts. 
 
 * The ensuing sketches liave been arranged chronologically, and 
 not according to the relative importance of the schools. 
 
12 Introductory Sketch. 
 
 Eton, Merchant Taylors', Marlborough, Christ 
 Hospital, and Westminster, are known as "Hojal 
 Schools," in allusion to their founders. 
 
 The opening of Winchester School marked a new 
 era in English boy life, for until then the work of 
 preparing lads for college had been entirely in the 
 hands of the monasteries or of private tutors or gov- 
 ernors. Upon William of Wykeham's plan, con- 
 ceived at the close of the Dark Ages, all the great 
 public schools of England were, with little alteration, 
 modeled. As a consequence, the methods were anti- 
 quated and the abuses many — some of the latter sur- 
 viving until our own day. At length the attention 
 of Government was called to the need of reform, and 
 the " Public Schools Act," modifying the usages and 
 practices of Eton, Winchester, Westminster, Charter- 
 house, Harrow, Rugby, and Shrewsbury schools, was 
 passed by Parliament July 31, 1868, and sundry 
 amendments thereto became part of the laws of the 
 realm in 1869, 1870, and 1873. New statutes for the 
 schools were issued in October and November, 1869. 
 The result of all this legislation was a modernization 
 of the government and arrangements of these ancient 
 
Intuoductoky Sketch. 13 
 
 foundations, and in nearly every case the changes 
 wrought have been for the better. 
 
 Pupils at these schools are " scholars " and " com- 
 moners." The "scholars" or "foundationers" are 
 supported by the schools, either freely or at com- 
 paratively small cost, entering by success in competi- 
 tive examinations. Their numbers are comparatively 
 small, Eton and Winchester maintaining seventy each ; 
 Kugby, sixty-one ; Harrow, thirty-one, and the rest in 
 proportion. The bulk of the numbers at every school 
 are "commoners," who live in the various masters' 
 houses attached to the schools, twenty to forty in each 
 house, and who pay for tuition and maintenance an- 
 nual sums varying from $400 to $500 at Marlborough 
 to $800 or $1,000 at Eton and Harrow. The two 
 classes are distinguished by their dress, the "schol- 
 ars" usually wearing a prescribed uniform. The 
 "commoners" wear various costumes, such as tall 
 hats and black jackets at Eton, speckled straw hats 
 and dark suits at Rugby, and the peculiar long dark 
 blue coats, yellow stockings, and no hat or cap, sum- 
 mer or winter, at Christ HospitaL 
 
 The government of the schools does not greatly 
 
1-i- Introductory Sketch. 
 
 differ. Each of the "forms" or divisions in which 
 eacli school is graded has a master who does all tlie 
 teaching in Latin, Greek, and English history. He 
 teaches his particular form only, and has nothing 
 more to do with a boy who has once passed beyond 
 it. Sometimes every boy in the school is put under 
 the care of a tutor — one of the masters, who may or 
 may not be tlie master of his form — and this tutor is 
 supposed to assist him in his studies and with advice 
 wlien needed, and generally to act as his friend. In 
 some of the schools these duties are assumed by the 
 highest or sixth-form boys. 
 
 The government of every English public school is 
 intrusted to a higher and a lower body. The former, 
 composed of the head-master and the house-masters, 
 deals with the graver class of offenses, and with 
 appeals from tlie lower body. The latter is made up 
 of the prefects, or monitors, as the sixth-form boys 
 are designated, and has really a great deal to do with 
 the government of the school. William of Wykeham 
 originated this system by directing that three boys of 
 age, scholarship, and judgment should be appointed 
 to advise the head-master in affairs of management. 
 
Intkoductory Sketch. 15 
 
 and they gradually assumed the authority of admin- 
 istration themselves. Many abuses thus crept in, as a 
 member of the sixth form could combine in himself 
 the offices of accuser, judge, and executioner. JS^ow 
 this state of things is changed, no boy being punished 
 until he has had opportunity of appeal. Closely 
 associated with this feature of school life is another, 
 the institution of "fagging." This practice, with 
 its name, originated in the scholars at Winchester 
 having in early days to keep the fire supplied with 
 fagots. By it, formerly, the younger boys were 
 compelled to black boots and perform many menial 
 offices for the sixth-form boys, but the services now 
 required are very light. 
 
 These schools proceed somewhat on the principle 
 that boys will not study for the mere love of it. 
 Inducements of many kinds are held out to tlieni 
 to advance in their studies. Many scholarships are 
 offered, of varying amounts, some tenable while in 
 the school, others enabling the holder to pay his way 
 subsequently through a university course. Another 
 inducement to a boy to do well is that he is thereby 
 relieved from the observance of a great many petty 
 
16 Introductorv Sketch. 
 
 rules and regulations. Nine tenths of tlie boys never 
 trouble themselves about scholarships, making it 
 their hio^hest aim to secure an advance now and then 
 from one form to another, without doing which tliej 
 would not be permitted to remain in the school. 
 
 It has been said that we have nothing in this coun- 
 try corresponding with the English public school, nor 
 liave we. 'No ordinary seminary or boarding-school 
 life comes anywhere near the peculiar atmosphere and 
 surroundings of such institutions as Eton, Harrow, 
 or Christ Hospital. Formerly the amount of learning 
 they instilled into the boys was small — the Parlia- 
 mentary Commission discovered instances of dreadful 
 ignorance on the part of some of the boys who stood 
 high in their classes — and although all this is now 
 changed for the better, it cannot be gainsaid that in 
 some instances the social advantages outweigh the 
 educational benefits. The associations and friend- 
 ships formed at Eton and Harrow, Westminster and 
 Winchester, are of untold value in after life, and, 
 like the mandarin's button, serve as a passport to the 
 best society, and an " open sesame " to the leading 
 professions — the Bar, the Army, and the Church. 
 
Intkoductory Sketch. 17 
 
 Above all, the public schools give polish and that 
 indescribable something called '• manners." Of 
 course, as the homely old adage has it, a silk purse 
 cannot be made out of a sow's ear, and the boy who 
 is by nature a boor or a bully, a coxcomb or a coward, 
 will probably remain such even after passing tlirougli 
 the searching ordeal of life at a public school ; wliile 
 a naturally brave and honest fellow, let him be never 
 so rough, will probably emerge from the fiery crnci- 
 ble refined and bettered, a gentle, manly youth. 
 
 Happy indeed the lads whose lines fall in such 
 pleasant places as these hoary and venerable old insti- 
 tutions, with their traditions and history running far 
 back into the romantic past, and their ancient annals 
 crowded with the names and deeds of English 
 worthies who trod their time-worn pavements in by- 
 gone days. 
 
 Some of the sketches contained herein were origi- 
 nally published in various periodicals over the 
 author's signature, but they have all been revised 
 and greatly lengthened in their present shape. 
 
 Acknowleds^ments are due to the Ilead-masters of 
 
18 Introductory Sketch. 
 
 Eton, Hiigby, Westminster, Ciiarterlionse, Merchant 
 Taylors', and Winchester schools, for information 
 kindly and promptly furnished in response to in- 
 quiries. 
 
 To Charterhouse, Past and Present, by William 
 Haig Brown, Head-master of that school ; to Etoniana 
 Ancient and Modern, by Lucas Collins ; to Lyte's 
 History of Eton College ; to WyTcehamica ; to the 
 Rughy School Register, 1675-1874:; to The Great 
 Schools of England, by Mr. E. Staunton ; to the 
 Hand-looh to the Principal Schools of England, by 
 C. E. Pascoe ; to Mr. G. F. Kussell Barker, for valu- 
 able data connected with Westminster School; and 
 to the various School Kegisters, the author is in- 
 debted for much valuable information and mnny 
 interesting details. H. F. 11. 
 
WINCHESTER COLLEGE 
 
 Plotto: 
 
 "MANNERS MAKYTH MAN." 
 
Winchester College 
 
 (ST. MARY'S.) 
 
 N the middle of the fourteenth 
 century, says J. R. Green, the 
 historian of the Englisli people, 
 "the great movement toward 
 freedom and unity which had 
 begun under the last of the Norman 
 kings seemed to liave reached its end, and 
 the perfect fusion of conquerors and con- 
 quered into an English people was marked 
 b}^ the disuse, even among the nobler classes, of the 
 French tongue. In spite of the efforts of the schools 
 and of the strength of fashion, English was winning 
 its way throughout the reign of Edward Third to its 
 final triumph in that of his grandson." This tendency 
 toward the general use of the tongue of the common 
 people had a powerful effect on literature and educa- 
 tion. Chaucer poured forth his matchless tales, and 
 " the new gladness of a great people utters itself in 
 his verse." The time is also noteworthy because of 
 
22 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 the establishment of the first of the great Enghsh 
 foundations known as " Public Schools." 
 
 " In those daj^s," sajs Froissart, " there reigned in 
 England a priest named William of Wykeham, who 
 was so much in favor with the king that every thing 
 was done by him, and nothing was done without 
 him." William Longe was born at Wykeham, Hamp- 
 shire, in the summer of 1324. Of humble birth, he 
 owed his education at the grammar school of Win- 
 chester to the generosity of J^icholas Uvedale, lord of 
 the manor of Wykeham and constable of Winchester 
 Castle ; and having served as secretary to that noble- 
 man and later filling the same post under Bishop 
 Edynton, of Winchester, he gained throngh their 
 influence a place at court in 1348. King Edward 
 Third appointed him clerk of the Royal Works in 
 1356, and he built Queenborough Castle in the Isle of 
 Sheppey. A nobler proof of his great ability as an 
 architect was the rebuilding of Windsor Castle, where, 
 however, the presumptuous legend " thys made 
 Wykeham," set up in a conspicuous place, had like 
 to cost him the king's favor, but for his clever expla- 
 nation that Windsor Castle was the making of Mm. 
 
 " Meanwhile from deacon's (1352) he rose to priest's 
 orders in the next ten years, and received (1357) the 
 
Winchester College. 23 
 
 Norfolk rectory of Pulbam, first in a long series of 
 church preferments, inchiding a deanery, archdea- 
 conry, and seventeen canonries. In 1359 he became 
 chief warden and surveyor of sundry royal castles 
 and manors, in 1363 warden of the king's forests on 
 the south side of Trent, in 1364 keeper of the Privy 
 Seal and secretary to Edward III. Being charged 
 with three others to negotiate the ransom of the 
 captive David II. (1365), he was raised to the see of 
 Winchester (1366), and within a twelvemonth created 
 Lord High Chancellor." 
 
 Wykeham was now at the zenith of his power, and 
 very soon his sun began to set. Having in 1371 
 resigned both the Great and the Privy Seals, he was 
 accused in 1376 of embezzlement, oppression, and 
 other acts of misgovernment. But the charge fell 
 through after costing him ten thousand marks ; and 
 from the restoration of his episcopal castles and the 
 reformation of the religious houses throughout his 
 diocese, he was free to turn to the great object of 
 his life — the founding of the two great institutions 
 of learning — New College, Oxford, and Winchester 
 School. Wykeham was not a controversialist ; 
 neither was he a Protestant like his great contempo- 
 rary, Wickliife ; rather was he a churchman who 
 
21 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 cared very little for doctrine and more for the solidity 
 and splendor of the Church's institutions. 
 
 His aim in founding Winchester School — the 
 first of its kind, and a pattern to Eton and all suc- 
 ceeding schools — is well set forth in his address in 
 1366: "Wherein I am wanting myself, that will I 
 supply by a brood of more scholars than all the prel- 
 ates of England ever showed." " Study the Script- 
 ures and grammar, the foundation stone, gateway, 
 and source of all other arts and sciences," is the main 
 precept of Wykeham's wise and liberal statutes, where 
 Wykehamists are led to esteem no man's person, but 
 themselves to observe that courtly bearing set forth 
 in the founder's motto, " Manners makyth man." 
 
 Wykeham having become once more Cliancellor, 
 from 1389-91, died at South Waltham, Se])tember 
 27, 1401, and was buried in Winchester Cathedral, 
 the nave of which he was then re-building. 
 
 The College of Winchester, called originally " Seinte 
 Marie College of Wynchestre," was founded in 1387, 
 and the buildings were completed in 1393. The build- 
 ings for the most part are of the time of the founder, 
 and consist of ten quadrangles and a cloister, together 
 with more recently erected houses for the commoners. 
 
 The foundation, says the school record, " consisted 
 
WmciJ ESTER College. 25 
 
 originally of a warden, ten fellows, seventy scholars, 
 a liead-master (informator)^ an usher {ostiarlus), or 
 second master, three chaplains, three clerks or singing- 
 men, and sixteen choristers. By an ordinance of the 
 Oxford University Commission, which took effect in 
 1857, the number of fellowships has been reduced, as 
 vacancies occur, to six, the number of scliolars being 
 increased to seventy-six, and eight exhibitions have 
 been founded. The charter of the school, whicli is 
 still in existence, was granted by Richard II. in 139G, 
 and confirmed by all the subsequent sovereigns, Mary 
 excepted, down to Charles II. The visitor is tlie 
 Bishop of Winchester, and the warden and two fel- 
 lows of New College, Oxford, hold an annual ' scru- 
 tiny,' which, however, is generally merely formal. 
 The endowment, which amounts at present to about 
 £15,500 annually, consists of landed property and 
 funded stock ; and of this about £2,600 goes to ex- 
 penses of management. The warden and fellows 
 are the governing body of the college. The pupils 
 of the school are of two classes — foundation scholars 
 and commoners. The scholars are elected, between 
 twelve and fourteen years of age, by competitiv^e ex- 
 amination ; the average annual number of vacancies 
 being twelve, and the number of candidates one 
 
26 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 hundred. The scholars are well boarded, lodged, 
 and educated, at the expense of the foundation ; hav- 
 ing to pay, for some incidental charges, books, medical 
 attendance, etc., about £30 per annum ; but tradi- 
 tion exercises a powerful influence at Winchester, 
 and many of the quaint old customs of the school, 
 such as dining off wooden trenchers, etc., are still re- 
 tained. The number of the commoners has fluctuated 
 much ; but, owing to the better position in which 
 they were placed by the new regulations of 1857, 
 they have averaged three hundred annually for some 
 years; they generally enter between twelve and 
 fifteen years of age, and stay three or four years, and 
 not being foundation-boys are boarded in the houses 
 of the head and other masters, at a total annual cost 
 of about £135 (including expense of tuition, pocket- 
 money, and cost of traveling). Winchester possesses 
 fifteen fellowships and thirty scholarships at New 
 College, Oxford, open to scholars and commoners 
 alike, and tenable for five years, besides numerous 
 other prizes." 
 
 William of Wykeham founded Winchester College 
 to prepare boys for the new course of study which in 
 1386 he had introduced at " New College," Oxford 
 University. Pupils received gratuitous instruction 
 
Winchester College. 27 
 
 and sustenance, the latter consisting at first almost 
 entirely of bread and beer ! A requisite to entrance 
 was a knowledge of the rudiments of Latin and 
 music. The course of study included Latin only till 
 1530, when Greek was introduced in the Sixth Form. 
 
 Winchester College stands a little without the 
 city, on College Street. A branch of the clear and 
 swift river Itchen passes through the warden's 
 garden on its way to join the parent stream. The 
 college consists of two courts, around which are 
 grouped the entrance tower, the school-room, the 
 chapel, the hall or refectory, the college library, and 
 the new school building — the last a comparatively 
 modern building, the ancient school wherein Wayn- 
 flete taught having been the room now known as 
 " the Seventh Chamber." 
 
 " At each side of the school are three tiers of fixed 
 seats, where the boys sit when * up to books.' Dis- 
 posed along other parts of the room are ranges of oak 
 benches, upon which stand the boxes, or ' scobs,' that 
 form a desk, and also a receptacle for books and writ- 
 ing materials." On the west wall, upon a large tab- 
 let, are painted a miter and crozier, to represent the 
 rewards of clerical learning ; a pen and inkhorn and 
 a sword, the insignia of civil and military pursuits ; 
 
28 ' School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 and a long Winton rod, typifying the punishment of 
 those too indolent to apply themselves to study or act- 
 ive life. Beneath each emblem is the appropriate 
 legend : Aut disce, " Either learn ; " Aiit discede, 
 " or depart hence ; " Manet sors tertia ccedi, " The 
 third choice is to be chastised." These three legends 
 liave been jocosely rendered by the boys : 
 
 ^&" 
 
 " Study hard, or elt>e be jogging, 
 Or you'll gel a plaguey flogging." 
 
 At the north end of the school are posted the rules 
 for the conduct of the students, which were drawn up 
 by Wykeham himself. 
 
 Winchester has its own peculiar arrangement and 
 classification of the scholars, as follows : 
 
 Sixth Book 
 
 f Senior Part. 
 
 I 
 Fifth Book... { Middle Part. 
 
 L Junior Part. 
 
 Senior Division. 
 
 Junior Division. 
 ( Senior Division. 
 ( Junior Division. 
 
 ( Senior Division. 
 I Junior Division. 
 
 {Senior Division. 
 Junior Division. 
 
 There are no lower forms, and the entire school is 
 thus classed in eight regular grades. The hours for 
 study are : From 7 to 7 : 30 — morning school ; 9 to 
 
Winchester College. 29 
 
 12 — middle school ; 3 to 6 — evening school. The 
 holidays consist of sixteen days at Easter, six weeks 
 at midsummer, and five weeks at Christmas. Every 
 saint's day is a holiday, and in " Common-time " (the 
 whole of the short half year and ten weeks of the long 
 lialf) there are three " Half Kemedies" in each week 
 —on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday. Only the reg- 
 ular saints' days are called " holidays ;" the ordinary 
 off days are called "Kemedies" and "Half Eem- 
 edies." 
 
 The boys sleep five or six in a room. In the day- 
 time, when not in school, the boys sit in the common 
 hall, where each boy has his " toy," or private cup- 
 board. The twenty senior boys have small private 
 studies. 
 
 Winchester has the honor of originating the name 
 and custom of fagging, as noted in the preface, and 
 the institution is to this day more jealously guarded 
 there than at any other public school. Though none 
 but the eighteen prefects have power to fag, they 
 use their privilege with great severity. Thus, " a boy 
 may be valet to one prefect, whom he waits on in his 
 chamber ; breakfast fag to another, whom he attends 
 at tea in hall ; and liable to be sent on errands and to 
 be made to field at cricket at the bidding of any pre- 
 
30 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 fe6t who may want those services performed. Some 
 of a fag's duties are of a very servile nature ; and as 
 the fagging in college is on a different footing from 
 the fagging in commons — the one depending on length 
 of standing in college, the other on position in school 
 — a boy who, being a commoner, is elected a scholar, 
 has to go through a second period of this abject 
 servitude." 
 
 The monitorial system also flourishes in greater 
 power at Winchester than at any other school, 'and 
 may be traced to the statutes of the founder himself. 
 There are eighteen of these monitors, or prefects, 
 who obtain their positions by seniority, and their 
 power over the boys is well-nigh absolute. For cent- 
 uries there was a custom in vogue, now happily abol- 
 ished, called "tuuding" (from the Latin Umdo, to 
 beat or bruise), which was a thrashing with ashen 
 sticks given to a school-fellow by one of these moni- 
 tors for a petty breach of discipline. The regular 
 punishments at Winchester consist of impositions 
 (to be learned by heart), confinement, caning, flogging, 
 and expulsion. Flogging is now a rare occurrence. 
 Formerly the boys were birched for the most trivial 
 offenses. " In fact," says an Old Boy, " a lad was not 
 considered a Wykehamist until he had been flogged. 
 
Winchester College. 31 
 
 In my own case this distinction was very speedily at- 
 tained. I became a Wykehamist almost as soon as I 
 entered the school, and made the acquaintance of the 
 instrument of torture, called vimen quadrifidiim, 
 which consists of a long handle with four apple twigs 
 tied at the end by way of a thong." 
 
 What is known as " Pulpiteens " at Winchester is 
 a peculiarity in classical teaching. All the boys of the 
 first three divisions are assembled at stated times for 
 construing lessons in Homer, Virgil, and Horace. 
 The prefects read out and construe about a hundred 
 lines of one of these authors. When the seniors have 
 gone as far as the master desires they are excused, 
 and then the assembled youngsters are called up one 
 by one to construe the same passage. 
 
 Another old custom consists in writing three times 
 a week a Latin epigram called a " Yulgus." The 
 head-master gives out a subject, and next morning 
 the boys are expected to hand in six lines of elegiac 
 verse as well turned as they can make it. " Stand- 
 ing-up Week " formerly occurred in the summer term, 
 when the boys were encouraged to stand up and re- 
 peat from memory as many lines of Latin or Greek 
 verse or prose as they could remember. 
 
 Side by side with the Wykeham " boy prefects " 
 
82 School-Boy Life in Meiiuie England. 
 
 may be placed the " boy tutors." Each of the ten 
 senior boys in college has assigned to him some of the 
 jmiiors as pupils. His province it is to examine and 
 correct the boys' exercises before they are shown to 
 the masters, and if a pupil is unable to do his work 
 the boy tutor is to assist him. The " boy tutor" is 
 also responsible in some degree for the good behavior 
 of tlie boys under him, and for all these duties he re- 
 ceives from the parents of the boy thus assisted the 
 sum of two guineas yearly. This is another survival 
 of the founder's regulations. 
 
 Mention must be made of the famous Dulce 
 Doinuin^ the holiday song of Winchester College. 
 Mr. Brandon says it was composed by a poor scholar 
 who w^as conlined for misconduct during the Whit- 
 suntide holidays, being, as report says, tied to a pillar. 
 After pouring out his sorrow in the w^ords of the 
 hymn he took to his room and died of a broken heart. 
 Such, at least, is one version of the story. On the 
 evening preceding the Whitsun holiday, and on the 
 last six Saturdays of the " long half," immediately 
 before "evening hills" (a time-honored "constitu- 
 tional " to St. Catherine's Hill), the masters, scholars, 
 and choristers walk in procession round the pillar 
 chanting the stanzas of the song. The music was 
 
Winchester College. 
 
 33 
 
 written by John Eeading, who died 1740, and who 
 also wrote the tune of " Adeste Fideles." 
 
 DULCE DOr.lUM 
 
 Moderato. 
 
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School- Boy Life in Mereie England. 
 
 1st Ydice 
 
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Winchester College. 
 
 35 
 
 tr 
 
 Chorus. 
 
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 Verse. 
 
 
 
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 Do - mum, D(t -mum Dul - ce Do-mum. Dul - ce, Dul - ce, 
 
 
 
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 Dul - ce Domuin, Dul - ce Do -mum re - - so-ne-mus. 
 
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 Dul - ce Do-mum, Dul - ce Do - mum re 
 
 
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36 School- Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 
 W^^^^ 
 
 
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 -*- -•- -*■ 
 
 HS3^ 
 
 Appropinquat ecce! felix 
 Hora gauclioruin : 
 Post grave ticdium 
 Advenit omnium 
 Meta i^etita laborum. 
 Cho. — Domum, Domnm, &c. 
 
 3. 
 
 Musa! libros mitto, fessa; 
 Mitte pensa dura: 
 Mitte negotium; 
 Jam datur otium: 
 Me mea mittito cura. 
 Cho. — Domum, Domum, &c. 
 
 4. 
 
 Ridet annus, prata rident: 
 Nosque rideamus. 
 Jam repetit Domum 
 Dauliasadvena: 
 Nosque Domum repetamus. 
 Cho. — Domum, Domum, &c. 
 
 5. 
 Heus! Rogere! fercaballos: 
 Eja! nunc eamus; 
 Limen amabile, 
 Matris et oscula, 
 Suaviter et rej^etamus. 
 Cho. — Domum, Domum, &c. 
 
 6. 
 
 Concinamus ad Penates; 
 Vox et audiatur: 
 Phospliore ! quid jubar, 
 Segnius emicans, 
 Gandia nostra moratur? 
 Cho. — Domum, Domum, 
 
 &c. 
 
Winchester College. 87 
 
 The sports and pastimes at Winchester are cricket, 
 racquets, fives, and football. There are no boating 
 facilities, the Itchen being a slender and turbulent 
 stream. But in ciicket the Wykehamists excel, and 
 they contend annually, and often successfully, against 
 Eton and Harrow, in one year (1851) Winchester van- 
 quishing both. The inatches between Winchester and 
 Eton are sometimes played at Lord's Ground, but 
 usually take place at one or other of the schools. 
 
 Among the eminent men who were educated at 
 Winchester may be enumerated eight archbishops and 
 more than threescore bishops. The bench, the army, 
 poetry, and literature are even better represented. 
 Here are a few of Wykeham's worthies: Dr. 
 Thomas Arnold and Matthew Arnold, his son ; An- 
 thony Ashley, better known as the Earl of Shaftes- 
 bury ; William Collins, the poet ; Christopher 
 Wordsworth, Bishop of Lincoln ; William Grocyn, 
 the linguist ; Bishop Ken, author of the world-famed 
 " Evening Hymn ;" Robert Lowth, Bishop of Lon- 
 don ; Trelawny, one of tlie followers of Monmouth, 
 whose danger after Sedgmoor raised the well-known 
 couplet : 
 
 " And shall Trelawny die? And shall Trelawny die? 
 
 Then thirty thousand Cornishraon will know the reason why;" 
 
38 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 Lord Redesdale, Irish Chancellor ; Mr. Justice 
 Nares ; Sir Rouiidell Pahner, sometime Attorney- 
 General ; Yisconnt Addington, Prime Minister in 
 1801 ; the Right Hon. Edward Card well; Sir Robert 
 Lowe — the last four all well-known statesmen. 
 Amons: soldiers and sailors of note we find Generals 
 Sir Robert Wilson, Lord Seaton, Sir Andrew Bar- 
 nard, Sir William Myers, Sir Alexander Woodford, 
 Sir W. S. Robbins, Bradshaw, and Carey, Admirals 
 Sir J. B. Warren, Young — nicknamed " Straightfor- 
 rard Young " — and Keats, who, ofi St. Domingo, car- 
 ried the frigate Siiperhe into action, lasliing a portrait 
 of Nelson to the mizzen rigging and causing the band 
 to play " The Battle of the Nile." 
 
 Edward Young, author of the " Night Thoughts," 
 was a Wykehamist, as was also Whitehead, poet lau- 
 reate in 1757, Charles Dibdin, Otway, and Somer- 
 ville. Her wits and men of letters are not a bit less 
 famous, among them being Andrew Borde, Sir Henry 
 Sidney, father of Sir Philip ; Sir Henry Wotton, 
 the friend of Milton ; Sir Thomas Brown, Joseph 
 Spence, the biographer of Pope ; Sydney Smith, and 
 a host of others. 
 
 " Wykehamists may well point with pride," says 
 Ml". Wolcott, " to the roll of those great and good 
 
Winchester College. 3D 
 
 men who liave sat in the same school, l:nelt in the 
 same chapel, cricketed or played at football in the 
 same field, bathed in the same stream, and venerated 
 her successful champions in senate, parish, bar, or 
 camp." 
 
 We close this chapter with an interesting account 
 of a visit paid to Winchester's old school by a noted 
 traveler and correspondent : * 
 
 Apart from the many illustrious men whom it has 
 produced, Winchester College has a special interest 
 of its own, from its having j^reserved more of its 
 original form and character than any other of the 
 great schools of England. Kugby and Harrow — 
 mere infants at best when compared with fourteenth- 
 century Winchester — are now modernized bej^ond 
 recognition. Even classic Eton itself would not be 
 likely to offer many familiar features to the eye of its 
 founder, Henry YI., if that most saintly of English 
 monarchs were to revisit it now. But Winchester, 
 although it has just celebrated its five hundredth an- 
 niversary, has succeeded in preserving till within a 
 very few years of the present time all the essential 
 features of what it was when it first came from the 
 hands of the good old Bishop who founded it in the 
 
 * David Ker. 
 
40 School-Boy Life in Mkkkie England. 
 
 days of Richard II. Even now, in spite of all recent 
 jiltei'ations, it retains enough of its mediaeval charac- 
 teristics to be one of the most picturesque and inter- 
 esting monuments of the past in the whole South of 
 England. 
 
 " You're just in time to see the place in working 
 order, for the school breaks up to-morrow," says one 
 of the masters, who has kindly undertaken to show 
 me every thing that is to be seen. " The Scotch and 
 Irish boys go down to-night and all the rest follow to- 
 morrow morning. It's rather a pity, by the bye, that 
 you weren't here for the anniversary celebration last 
 Friday and Saturday, for as it was our five hundredth 
 anniversarj^, of course we made as big a thing of it 
 as w^e could." 
 
 "I must try to console myself," answer I. "But 
 where are you taking me now?" 
 
 " To the porter's lodge, where a good many of our 
 'college antiques' are preserved. He's quite a char- 
 acter, this porter of ours, and if you had time for a 
 regular talk with him he could tell you a good deal 
 til at would be well worth hearing." 
 
 Tlie next moment we find ourselves in front of the 
 low doorway of the porter's lodge, which is quite filled 
 up by the burly figure of the worthy porter himself, a 
 
WiNciiESTEii College. 41 
 
 riiddj, stalwart John Bull, wliose jolly face seems to 
 make quite a snnshine in the shadowy interior, lie 
 greets us heartily, and proceeds to exhibit with evi- 
 dent satisfaction his nniseum of local ciirioeities. 
 First comes an ancient " scourge," used in maintain- 
 ing the discipline of the school, not unlike a long- 
 handled birch broom, the supple, wiry, whip-liko 
 twigs of which must have been no joke to encounter 
 when wielded by some muscular pedagogue whose 
 heart was in his w^ork. Next in the list ligures a 
 quaint, old-fashioned desk of dark oak — one of those 
 which the young students call " toys " in their jx'cu- 
 liar dialect — at wdiich the Wykehamists of former 
 generations used to prepare their lessons. Among 
 the countless names rudely carved or scribbled upon 
 its surface is one for the preservation of wdiich every 
 lover of English literature and natural history will be 
 thankful—" Frank Buckland, 1844." Then follow a 
 number of antique tiles — with the pattern of a star 
 or a lily neatly worked upon each — dug up during 
 the repairs of the college kitchen. Several clumsy 
 iron keys of the old school and a few rather clever 
 carvings done by the boys themselves complete the 
 collection. 
 
 The inspection over, we marched out into the great 
 
42 ScriooL-BoY Life in Merrie En(;land. 
 
 quadrangle, where the porter points with a broad 
 grin to a stone trough close to the wall, overhung 
 by a spout, and informs us that within the memory 
 of living man this trough and spout represented the 
 washing apparatus reserved for the use of the school- 
 boys. "Wliy, there's plenty of gentlemen been to 
 visit the place," says he, " who remember quite well 
 having washed themselves at that trough when they 
 were at school here." " It must have taken a very 
 long while," suggest I, " for so many boys to wash 
 here one after another." " Well, I don't know about 
 that, sir," rejoins the porter with a significant 
 chuckle, " for you see each boy wouldn't waste much 
 time over the job, anyhow." 
 
 From this historical trough w^e pass to the college 
 kitchen. In the vestibule of the kitchen is a very 
 queer old picture, which was unearthed in the course 
 of repairs, after lying concealed for more than three 
 centuries. The painting represents a human figure 
 in the embroidered blue coat and red hose of an old- 
 fashioned English serving-man, with an ass's head, a 
 pig's snout, a padlock on his under jaw, a sword by 
 his side, and a shield at his back, the sharp hoofs of 
 a stag instead of feet, a pitchfork, broom, and shovel 
 grasped in his left hand, while his right is out- 
 
Winchester College. 43 
 
 stretched and open. This extraordinary hobgoblin is 
 labeled " The Trusty Servant," and the explanation 
 of the allegory — which certainly appears to need one 
 — is given by an inscription in Latin verse beneath 
 the portrait, to which the following translation is 
 subjoined : 
 
 " A trusty servant's portrait would j'ou see, 
 This emblematic figure well survey. 
 The porker's snout 'not nice in diet' shows, 
 The paddock shut — no secrets he'll disclose ; 
 Patient the ass his master's wrath will bear, 
 Swiftness in errand the stag's feet declare. 
 Loaded his left hand 'apt to labor' saith. 
 The vest his neatness, open hand his faith; 
 Girt with his sword, his shield upon his arm, 
 Himself and master he'll protect from harm." 
 
 After a short survey of the kitchen itself — which 
 presents no very notew^orthy features except the mass- 
 ive beams of black oak which cross and recross its 
 whitewashed ceiling — we pass on to the school chapel. 
 Modernized though it is, it is undeniably worth see- 
 ing, but its chief interest centers upon the memorial 
 tablets at the entrance. Here one may read the 
 names of the brave lads who went straight from the 
 cricket field to the battle field, and died like English 
 soldiers upon tlie fatal hill-side of the Alma or the 
 trampled uplands around Sebastopol. It was indeed 
 
41 School- Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 a just and noble thought which traced beneath the 
 shrine of these heroic dead the grand and consohng 
 words spoken ages ago by Him in vvlioni is life ever- 
 lasting: "God is not a God of the dead, but of the 
 living, for all live unto him." 
 
 But if the chapel be modern, the cloisters beyond 
 it are not. The ribbed roof with its mighty oaken 
 rafters, tlie pointed arches, the massive pillars, the 
 ghostly shadow and deep dreamy stillness — amid 
 which the echo of our footsteps sounds unnaturally 
 loud — all speak so strongly of the past that we should 
 liardly be surprised to see William of Wykeham him- 
 self, with his episcopal crozier and miter, come 
 sweeping toward us from the door of the beautiful 
 chantry which he built here *' for the repose of his 
 soul," and which is certainly as well worth a visit as 
 any spot in the whole college, 
 
 " Now we come to the old school-room," says our 
 guide, unlocking another door, " but it's been so much 
 altered of late that you would hardly know it again if 
 you had seen it in its original state. I have an en- 
 graving of it at home as it was before the alterations, 
 Avhich I'll show you when we have finished our in- 
 spection. You see there are still a few relics of the 
 old style remaining. That arm-chair raised above 
 
WiNciiL-STER College. 45 
 
 the floor at the upper end of tlie room was for the 
 head-mastei", and two of the presidents sat in tliose 
 two chairs to right and left of it. Then the bojs, 
 when they had prepared their lessons at tlie lower 
 end of the room, came np and said them on that long 
 oaken bench that runs along the wall below the 
 head-master's chair, and that's why we still talk 
 of 'going up to books' instead of 'going into school.' 
 And there, on that board up above the door, are the 
 original Latin rules of the school, if you can see to 
 read them." 
 
 There they are, sure enough, those quaint, crabbed 
 symbols of the iron discipline prevalent in the 
 " good old times," when no boy was supposed to have 
 properly completed his education unless he had been 
 flogged at least once or twice a week till the blood 
 ran down. One can fancy what the young scape- 
 graces of that age would think of injunctions to 
 " keep their eyes modestly fixed upon the ground," 
 and to " let nothing light or profane be read among 
 them," a rule whicli must have borne very hard upon 
 any poor little fellow who had secretly brought his 
 favorite " Arabian Nights " or " Kobinson Crusoe " 
 into school alono^ with him. 
 
 By this time the day is wearing toward afternoon, 
 
46 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 and we have to make short work of the great 
 dining hall, which, with its dai-k Ciiken screen and 
 antiquated " buttery hatch," looks more thoroughly 
 mediaeval than any thing we have yet seen. On a 
 kind of raised dais at the upper end of the room ap- 
 pears a small round table with a single knife and fork 
 upon it, intended for the use of the luckless official 
 whose duty it is to preside at the school dinners, and 
 who sits here in solitary state, like a professional 
 Robinson Crusoe on an extremely limited island. 
 As I begin to make notes of these details there is 
 produced for my inspection one of the old-fashioned 
 "platters" formerly used in this hall, which are now 
 almost superseded by the modern plate. It is a 
 smooth, square piece of wood, hardly bigger than an 
 ordinary Dutch stove tile, and absolutely without rim 
 or protection of any sort along its edges. 
 
 " How on earth did they manage with their gravy 
 in those days ? " ask I, looking wonderingly at this 
 characteristic sample of the wisdom of our ancestors. 
 " It seems to me that they might just as well have 
 eaten their dinners off the table itself — rather better, 
 in fact, for then tlie gravy would have had farther to 
 run." 
 
 "Well," was the laughing reply, "I believe the 
 
Winchester College. 47 
 
 correct thing was to make a wall of potatoes along 
 the four sides, and then put the gravy in the 
 middle. Besides, I dare say that in the good old 
 times they didn't trouble themselves as much about 
 a few splashes of grease, more or less. See, here's 
 one of our ancient ' black jacks.' " 
 
 He points to a huge antique jug of black leather, 
 which, although now leaky and useless, has evidently 
 seen plenty of service in its time. When filled to 
 the brim it must certainly have held a gallon of 
 strong beer, and even the miglity drinkers of the 
 olden time probably found one such bumper quite 
 enough for them. I inwardly wonder whether one 
 of the essential qualifications required from a six- 
 teenth century master of the school can have been 
 the capacity of emptying this formidable tankard at 
 a single draught without taking breath, or whether 
 the boys were permitted to drink out of it ? 
 
 Then we go through some of the old rooms, which, 
 with their oaken " supporting pillar " in the center, 
 and their deep, niche-like windows, with stone steps 
 leading up to them, are certainly a curious sight. In 
 one corner I notice a queer antique bedstead, said to 
 date back to the time of William of Wykeham him- 
 self, with a kind of a wooden hutch over the head of 
 
48 
 
 School-Boy Life in Mereie England. 
 
 it, not unlike the liood of a cab. But this ancient 
 bed, on which some mediaeval youngster once 
 dreamed of endless holidays and unlimited taffy, now 
 serves tlie ominous purpose of containing the official 
 birches used in administering punishment. 
 
ETON COLLEGE 
 
 iimotto : 
 
 FLOREAT ETONA." 
 
Eton College 
 
 " Then, hand in hand, her Tames the Forrest softly brings, 
 To that siipreainest place of the great English kings, 
 The Garters Rojall seate, from him who did advance 
 That princely order first, our first that conquered France ; 
 The Temple of Saint George, wheras his honored knights, 
 Upon his hallowed day, observed their ancient rites: 
 Where Eaton is at hand to nurse that learned brood, 
 To keepe the Muses still neere to this Princely Flood; 
 Tliat nothing there may want, to beautifie that seate. 
 With every pleasure stor'd: And here my song compleate." 
 
 — Drayton. 
 
 LOATING seaward down the 
 historic river of Thame the voy- 
 ager, soon after leaving tlie ma- 
 jestic towers and turrets of Wind- 
 ^^ sor, comes to a scene of quiet beauty, 
 the foreground of which consists of hish 
 meadows witli sedgy banks, in marked con- 
 trast to the opposite chalky cliff crowned 
 with its noble keep. Beyond the meadow, whereon 
 cattle browse and low, he sees a cluster of mellow- 
 toned brick buildings, the arch and pinnacles of an 
 
52 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 ecclesiastical edifice of some sort rising still further 
 bejond. This is tlie first glimpse of Eton College 
 as seen from tlie river. From the town of Windsor 
 or from the terrace of the castle one may gain a more 
 extended view, but no approach to this nursery of 
 youth equals in beauty the view from the historic 
 stream. 
 
 Among the quintet of Royal Schools Eton stands 
 pre-eminent — not that the education furnislied there 
 is any better than at Harrow or Rugby, Winchester 
 or Westminster — but on account partly of its great 
 antiquity and honorable traditions, and partly because 
 of the large number of noble names associated with 
 its annals, whether as mastei-s or scholars. It is, in 
 fact, England's greatest school. The Duke of Well- 
 ington once said that "the battle of Waterloo was 
 won in the playing fields of Eton," for it was the 
 game of foot-ball that taught him strategy. 
 
 Eton is a pleasant town of Buckinghamshire, on 
 the left bank of the Thames, opposite the royal town 
 of Windsor, with which it is connected by a graceful 
 bridge. This part of the valley of Thame is historic 
 ground. Runnymede is but a few miles away, and 
 the castle, park, and forest of Windsor are almost at the 
 school gates. Thomas Gray, the poet, an enthusiastic 
 
Eton College. 53 
 
 Etonian, lias well pictured the beauties of the site of 
 Eton. 
 
 In his lines " On a Distant Prospect of Eton 
 College " the author of the famous " Elegy " has 
 given us one of the most thoughtful and beautiful 
 productions of his muse. In it he pursues the same 
 sweetly melancholy train of thought that distin- 
 guishes the " Elegy " from nearly every poem in our 
 language, and both it and the " Lines " are in the 
 minor key. We give them here in full : 
 
 *' Ye distant spires, ye antique towers, 
 
 That crown the water}' glade, 
 Wliere grateful science still adores 
 
 Her Henry's holy shade ; 
 And ye that from the stately brow 
 Of Windsor's heights th' expanse below 
 
 Of grove, of lawn, of mead survey, 
 "Whose turf, whose shade, whose flowers among, 
 Wanders the hoary Thames along 
 
 His silver-winding way ; 
 
 Ah, happy hills, ah, pleasing shade, 
 
 Ah, fields beloved in vain, 
 Where once my careless childliood strav'd, 
 
 A stranger yet to pain ! 
 I feel the gales that from you blow 
 A momentary bliss bestow, 
 
 As waving fresh their gladsome wing. 
 My weary soul they seem to soothe, 
 And, redolent of joy and youth, 
 
 To breathe a second spring. 
 
54: School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 Say, Father Thames, for lliou hast seen 
 
 Full many a sprightly race, 
 Disporthig on thy margent green, 
 
 The paths of pleasure trace. 
 Who foremost now delight to cleave, 
 Witli pliant arm thy glassy wave ? 
 
 Tlie captive hnnet which enthral? 
 What idle progeny succeed 
 To chase the rolling circle's speed, 
 
 Or urge the flying ball? 
 
 Wliile some on earnest business bent, 
 
 Their murm'ring labors ply, 
 'Gainst graver hours that biing constraint 
 
 To sweeten liberty ; 
 Some bold adventurers disdain 
 The limits of their little reign, 
 
 And unknown regions dare descry ; 
 Still as they run they look behind, 
 They hear a voice in every wind. 
 
 And snatch a fearful joy. 
 
 Gay hope is theirs by fancy fed. 
 
 Less pleasing when possess'd ; 
 The tear forgot as soon as shed, 
 
 The sunshine of the breast : 
 Theirs buxom health, of rosy hue ; 
 Wild wit, invention ever new ; 
 
 And lively cheer, of vigor born ; 
 The thoughtless day, tlie easy night, 
 The spirits pure, the slumbers light, 
 
 That tiy th' approach of morn. 
 
Eton College. 55 
 
 Alas! regardless of their doom, 
 
 The little victims plr-y! 
 No sense have they of ills to come, 
 
 Nor care beyond to-day ; 
 Yet see how all around them wait 
 The ministers of human fate, 
 
 And black misfortune's baleful train. 
 Ah ! show them where in ambush stand, 
 To seize their prey, the murd'rous baud; 
 
 Ah! tell them they are men! 
 
 These shall the fury passions tear, 
 
 Tlie vultures of the mind. 
 Disdainful anger, pallid fear. 
 
 And shame that skulks behind; 
 Or pining love shall waste their youth, 
 Or jealousy with rankling tooth, 
 
 That inly gnaws the secret heart ; 
 And envy wan, and faded care, 
 Grim-visaged, comfortless despair. 
 
 And sorrow's piercing dart. 
 
 Ambition tliis shall tempt to rise, 
 
 Then whirl the wretch from high, 
 To bitter scorn a sacrifice 
 
 And grinning infamy. 
 The stings of falsehood those shall try. 
 And hard unkindness' altered eye, 
 
 That mocks the tear it forced to How; 
 And keen remorse, with blood defiled, 
 And moody madness laugliing wild 
 
 Amid severest woe. 
 
56 School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 Lo, in tlie vale of years benealh, 
 
 A grisly troop are seen, 
 The painful family of death, 
 
 More hideous than their queen : 
 This racks the joints, this tires the veins, 
 That every laboring sinew strains, 
 
 Those in the deeper vitals rage ; 
 Lo, poverty to fill the band, 
 That numbs the soul with icy hand 
 
 And slow-consuming age. 
 
 To each his sufferings ; all are men, 
 
 Condemn'd alike to groan ; 
 The tender for another's pain, 
 
 Th' unfeeling for his own. 
 Yet, ah I why should they know their fate ? 
 Since sorrow never comes too late, 
 
 And happiness too swiftly flics; 
 Thought would destroy our paradise — 
 No more; — where ignorance is bliss 
 
 'Tis folly to be wise. 
 
 The college was begun in IMO, fifty-eiglit years 
 after the founding of Winchester school, by "William 
 Waynflete, Bishop of Winchester, under the patron- 
 age of Henr}^ YI., the Scholar King, and with the 
 title of " the College of the Blessed Mary of Eaton 
 beside Windsor." The buildings were completed in 
 1523. Waynflete brought with him, we are told, 
 -Rvc fellows and thirty-five scholars from Wykeham's 
 College, and he organized the new foundation exactly 
 
Eton College. 5Y 
 
 on the model of the older one. The charter of Eton 
 provided that the master {informator) was to be a 
 master of arts, and unmarried. His salary was to be 
 24 marks (<£16=$80), with rooms, and an allowance 
 of £4 6s. 8d. ($21 60) for commons. He had one 
 gown a year, which he was forbidden to sell or 
 pledge, and he was enjoined not to indulge in such 
 fashionable vanities " as red, green, or white shoes." 
 
 On the foundation there is provision for a provost, 
 a head-master, and ten fellows, who constitute the 
 governing body, two cliaplains, and seventy king's 
 scholars, and there have been from three to nine 
 hundred "oppidans" in attendance at various times 
 since. Anciently there was also provision for ten clerks, 
 sixteen choristers, and thirteen almsmen, for in those 
 old times a place for the poor was provided in almost 
 every public institution. The members of the gov- 
 erning body are nominated by the universities of 
 Oxford and Cambridge. The almsmen or pensioners 
 were aged or infirm men who were unable to work. 
 Before they could be admitted they must be able to 
 
 y the Lord's Prayer and the Creed, and whenever 
 diey went beyond the college walls they had to wear 
 gowns. The almshouse ceased to exist in the life- 
 time of the founder. The " fellows " of Eton were 
 
58 School-Boy Life in Merrie England 
 
 priests who could if they chose spend all their days 
 in study within the college, but were not allowed to 
 marry. They, too, have been abolislied. The " col- 
 legers," or king's scholars, reside within the school 
 gates, and get their education at a nominal charge 
 owing to the rich endowment funds. The " oppi- 
 dans " are scholars who attend the school, enjoy all 
 its honors and privileges, pay liberally for their tui- 
 tion and board, and reside in the town. 
 
 The seventy scholars '' on the foundation " were 
 formerly elected annually, as vacancies occurred, to 
 King's College, Cambridge, by the provost, vice- 
 provost, and head-master of Eton and the provost and 
 two fellows of King's College, who came down to 
 Eton for the purpose late in July or early in August. 
 Much pomp and ceremony were anciently observed 
 on this occasion. " The two provosts used to meet 
 at the college gates, and greet each other with the 
 kiss of peace, even within present memory, and many 
 other antique courtesies passed between the Eton and 
 Cambridge electors." But nowadays the successful 
 candidates for Cambridge are chosen by means of 
 a strict competitive examination held in the uni- 
 versity. 
 
 The domestic side of Eton life is peculiar to itself. 
 
Eton College. 59 
 
 The " collegers," as we have said, live at the school, 
 where the study and bedroom are in one, each boy 
 having liis own solitary apartment. For the conven- 
 ience of the oppidans there are about twenty board- 
 ing-houses kept by masters, and ten or a dozen others 
 kept by '' Dames." Some of these boarding-houses 
 have as few as half a score of youngsters, while in 
 some of the houses there are as many as iifty. In 
 these houses, too, the boys dine and spend their even- 
 ings with the family. The advantages of this system 
 must be apparent over against the " every man for 
 himself" mode of life at Rugby. Oddly enough, 
 the keeper of a boarding-house is called a " Dame," 
 whether male or female ! 
 
 The dormitories in the college are models of com- 
 pactness and neatness. The Eton boy's room is em- 
 phatically his castle. " The bed folds up very neatly 
 and takes no room, the washing apparatus and the 
 brushes and combs are put out of sight, a large cup- 
 board contains table-cloths and tea-things, together 
 with such supplies of additional dainties as the pocket 
 of the occupant can afford. Often the table is cov- 
 ered with books and adorned with flowers ; the man- 
 tel-shelf has a fringe of his sister's handiwork and a 
 few choice ornaments which remind him of liome. 
 
60 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 The walls are so covered with pictures that there is 
 scarcely a square inch left, the post of honor being 
 occupied by photographs of his own home and of ]iis 
 nearest relations." Then follow pictures of " moving 
 adventures by flood and field," the finish of a lonoj 
 run to Hare and Hounds, the stage coach in a flood, 
 a fishing or a boating scene, and a group of dogs or 
 birds. Over the mantel orthodoxy requires that the 
 Scliool Almanac be pasted, tlie rules of the school 
 societies the boy belongs to, and a few visiting cards 
 are stuck in the little mirror, while in divers nooks 
 and on sundry pegs are scattered the numerous caps 
 and hats of many and divers colors which he is en- 
 titled to wear or has ever worn, his favorite cricket 
 bat, the tiny pennant won by his boat in the last 
 race, if he is a " Wet-bob," as well as tlie pewter 
 "mngs" gained in athletic contests. 
 
 From the very earliest date Eton seems to have been 
 what it has remained down to the present — a nursery 
 for the gentlemen of England. King Henry YII. 
 was an Etonian. In the celebrated " Paston Letters," 
 which were penned in the reign of the monarch just 
 named, we are told that country gentlemen rode up 
 from Norfolk to attend the school, " and Latin verses 
 seem to have formed tlien, as they do now, the sum- 
 
Eton College. 61 
 
 mit of the scholar's efforts toward distinction. It is 
 therefore not uniitting that the effigy of the king to 
 whom all Etonians owe so much should be one of 
 the first objects presented to the sight of the new 
 boj as he arrives at the school." The statue of the 
 royal founder stands in the midst of the school- 
 yard, the center of all the life and motion of the 
 place. 
 
 First and foremost let ns make a tour of the public 
 buildings of Eton. On the right hand, looking up 
 the school-yard, is the venerable gray chapel, pictur- 
 esque and beautiful in its mellow old age. Large as 
 it is (it will accommodate seven hundred boys), it 
 was the plan of the founder to make it merely the 
 chancel of a noble cathedral church. But his am- 
 bitious designs were interrupted by civil war, and 
 wall and buttress stood roofless for many years, until 
 at length it w^as deemed best to complete the work 
 on a more modest scale. Behind the statue of the 
 founder is a low arch conducting into the cloisters. 
 The clock-tower, containing a beautiful oriel window, 
 dates from the time of the eighth Henry — a century 
 later than the chapel. The oriel window here re- 
 ferred to lights the " election-chamber ; " the row of 
 windows on the left is that of the " election-hall," a 
 
62 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 private dining-room of tlie provost of Eton. These 
 rooms are redolent of historic memories. Here Sir 
 Henry Saville and Sir Henry Wotton lived and re- 
 ceived their guests. Here Bacon, not long before 
 his death, spent a few days " in such company as he 
 loved," and conceived a wisli to spend the last days 
 of his existence in the seclusion of these learned 
 shades. Here Sir Henry Wotton, after serving his 
 country as diplomat at nearly every court in Europe, 
 at a time when men of affairs needed " an open brow 
 and a closed mouth," receiv^ed a visit from the then 
 youthful John Milton, who lived in the near-by vil- 
 lage of Horton, praised the early efforts of his muse, 
 and "gave that advice and wrote those introductions 
 which were to start the young scholar on his foreign 
 tour and fill his mind with rich and never-dying 
 memories." 
 
 The rooms of the Provost's Lodge are decorated 
 with the portraits of many of Eton's noblest sons — 
 embryo statesmen and soldiers, priests and poets, men 
 of affairs or men of fashion — their boyish faces look- 
 ing out at us from the canvas ere the " pale cast of 
 thought" has put its liard impress upon them. This 
 gallery of portraits extends in time over a century 
 and a half, and pity 'tis that it should ever have been 
 
Eton College. 63 
 
 interrupted. In them we read that Eton has always 
 been " the chief nurse of England's statesmen." 
 
 On the left of the " quad " — Etonian for quadrangle 
 — opposite the chapel, is the building which formerly 
 contained the Long Chamber, the dormitory of the 
 seventy collegers, who may be styled the kernel of 
 the school, the " oppidans " being in theory simply 
 the private pupils of the head-master. Long Cham 
 ber is now diverted from its former nse, and with it 
 has passed away that old rough school-life which, 
 disagreeable in the present and amusing in the retro- 
 spect, is nevertheless now happily numbered with the 
 things of long ago. Kare and racy are the stories of 
 those old days — " of turning up in beds and tossing 
 in blankets ; of midnight orgies confined to the upper 
 boys, who were permitted any license themselves on 
 the condition of restraining their younger compan- 
 ions ; the stories round the chamber fire ; the tortur- 
 ing of the Jews or of the unlucky oppidans whose 
 fortunes led them to seek a place on the foundation ; 
 the surreptitious theatricals, in which Queen Elizabeth 
 reviewed her troops at Tilbury Fort, or where the 
 lower boys, dressed as 'mutes, swallowed the liquids,' 
 as Horace Walpole has informed us, or where the 
 story of Jezebel was acted to the life, and the body 
 
64 Scno()L-T>oY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 of the offending queen (personated by a ' small oppi- 
 dan ') was ' tin-own down ' with violence onto the floor 
 below. Rarely were these amusements interrupted, 
 but when 'the Doctor' did intervene to stop the ir- 
 regularities a friendly butler walked before rattling 
 his ponderous bunch of keys, lest a sight too awful 
 should meet the eyes of the offended chief." 
 
 Rising over the Long Chamber, on the right of the 
 clock tower, is the high-pitched roof of the college 
 hall, now " resplendent with tapestried dais, stained- 
 glass windows, richly ornamented gallery, and carved 
 stone fire-places. In the body of the hall dine 
 tlie seventy collegers ; at the high table preside the 
 fellows. The portraits are those of collegers who 
 have become famous in their country's service. 
 Archbishop Sumner smiles blandly from between his 
 lawn sleeves ; Earl Camden looks as grave and wise 
 as an owl under his Lord Chancellor's cap ; and Lord 
 Stratford de Redcliffe plants his foot haughtily on a 
 carpet of Turkey red." 
 
 The buttery and the cellars are well worth a visit, 
 as is also the college kitchen, a noble room with a 
 peculiar conical or funnel-shaped roof to carry off the 
 steam and savor of a thousand dinners. " Here an 
 ox may be roasted whole, and plum-j^uddings boiled 
 
Eton College. 65 
 
 for the population of a good-sized town." In one 
 corner of the cloisters stands the college pump, the 
 beauty of whose w'ater is not to be surpassed. The 
 houses round the court are the abodes of the Eton 
 fellows, retired mastei's who here find a peaceful 
 haven in old age. 
 
 The school-yard is entered from the Slough Road 
 by a passage under the Upper School, a long build- 
 ing erected by Provost Godolphin in the reign of 
 Queen Anne. "' It runs along the whole west side 
 of the ^ quad,' and underneath it is a covered cloister 
 which affords shelter to boys waiting for their lessons 
 to begin, and an occasional retreat to football and fives 
 players who have been driven in by stress of 
 weather." The ITp23er School is a noble room, deco- 
 rated with busts of sovereigns and statesmen. The 
 walls are paneled with oak, and cut with the names of 
 old Etonians. " Time was," we are told, " when boys 
 cut their own names on the walls, but this is long 
 past. Five or ten shillings secures the knife of the 
 official carver, who hands down the youth's name to 
 posterity accompanied by those of his competitors 
 wdio leave at the same time as himself. In one 
 panel there can be but little doubt that the mass- 
 ive letters C + 1 4- FOX represent the handicraft of 
 5 
 
G6 ScHOor-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 the statesman wliose bust smiles on us from above. 
 It is interesting, also, to notice the number of well- 
 known names which occur in this little space of the 
 wall's surface — Chatham, Howe, Wellington, Can- 
 ning, Hammond, Porson, and Gray are names of 
 which any school may be proud." 
 
 The " Library," as the head-master's room is called, 
 leads out of the Upper School. This is where the 
 Sixth Form (the highest) boys are taught. It is 
 beautilully decorated, the walls being adorned with 
 bas-reliefs depicting scenes from classic myth. Here, 
 too, is the honor-roll of the Newcastle scholars, with 
 the bust of the donor of the scholarship over all. 
 
 Exactly under Long Chamber is the Lower School, 
 running at right angles to the Upper School. The 
 room dates from the sixteenth century, and is " the 
 original home of Eton scholarship and learning." 
 The architecture is heavy and anticpie, while the 
 massive desks and seats are hacked and mutilated by 
 the ruthless knives of generations of boys. 
 
 But both Upper and Lower School have long been 
 outgrown. What are known as the New Schools are 
 in an imposing pile across the Slongh Ivoad, a Russian 
 cannon, trophy of the Crimean War, standing sen- 
 tinel-like outside the gates. These rooms are large, 
 
Eton College. G7 
 
 light, and airy, provided with every modern appli- 
 ance, inchiding a fine-toned pipe-organ for the use of 
 sucli as wish to study music, an observatoi'y with a 
 powerful telescope, and a chemical laboratory. 
 
 Here is the order of the day's Ufe at Eton : Eirst 
 comes " morning school " for half an hour, at seven 
 in summer and half-past seven in winter. Breakfast 
 occupies the next hour. Then there is a half-hour's 
 chapel service, at which attendance is compulsory for 
 all. '' Ten o'clock school " may be said to begin the 
 studies of the day ; it continues from 9:45 to 10:30, 
 and is immediately followed by " eleven o'clock 
 school," which occupies the time till noon. Then 
 comes a recess for the upper forms, called the " after 
 twelve," but the lower school goes on with study 
 until 1:30 or 2 o'clock. At the latter hour dinner is 
 served for all. " After two " is a brief school session 
 from 3 to 3:30, followed by a recess from 3:45 to 
 4:15, called '' after four," when most of the boys go 
 for a promenade on the High Street. '' Lock-up " in 
 winter comes at five o'clock, which makes the even- 
 ings to be spent in-doors in study and recreation very 
 long. 
 
 Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays are half-holi- 
 days, and there are no studies on those days in the 
 
C8 School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 afternoons, the plaj-time being only interrupted by 
 " absence," a roll-call or " calling over " similar to tlie 
 Harrow " bill." Oddly enough, one says, is the name 
 " absence " given to a ceremony at which every one 
 must be present. Nobody knows w^hy or how the 
 name originated. After three o'clock " absence " 
 there is a general rush for the playing-fields and the 
 river. The praepostors, or monitors, have to hunt up 
 all boys who do not answer at " absence," and report 
 the reason for their non-attendance. 
 
 During the day, at times when school is not in ses- 
 sion, the boys have the utmost liberty of action. 
 They go and come as they please, the chief restriction 
 being that they must be in their houses and then in 
 their rooms by a definite hour. ^' Calling over " is at 
 5 in winter and 8:45 in summer, when each master 
 calls over the names of his boys. 
 
 " The improvements carried out of late years in 
 tlie buildings and other arrangements at Eton," says 
 an old Etonian, " have been very great. The old 
 schools were very close and inconvenient. But in tlie 
 summer of 1863 a block of new buildings was com- 
 pleted which contains thirteen class-rooms besides a 
 music-room, with the entrances and staircases so ar- 
 ranged as to avoid the crowding and confusion which 
 
Eton College. G9 
 
 occasionally used to take place. The old Upper and 
 Lower Schools remain unaltered — indeed, there are 
 liistorical interests associated with their homely feat- 
 ures which no Etonian would wish to see desecrated 
 by any modern restorer. The latter room is still very 
 much what it was in Queen Elizabeth's days. There 
 yet remain the double row of ungainly oaken pillars 
 which, by the singularity of their arrangement, gave 
 rise to a tradition that the room had been originally 
 the college stable. On the oaken ' shuts ' of the win- 
 dows may still be read the names of the scholars 
 carved as they w^ere elected to King's College, and 
 which struck Pepys on his visit as so pretty a custom. 
 On the farthest shutter are those of the election of 
 1564, the chief authors of the poems which welcomed 
 Queen Elizabeth in the previous year, while there are 
 several of even earlier date." 
 
 Fagging* at Eton is now merely nominal, except 
 in the college and among the collegers. " The priv- 
 ilege belongs to the Sixth Form and the whole of 
 the Fifth, except the lowest division. These last hold 
 a neutral position, and all below the Fifth, to the 
 number of from four to six hundred, are fags. Un- 
 like most other public schools, there is no fagging at 
 
 *For the oriofin of ibis word see the Preface. 
 
TO SciiooL-BoY Life in Mi:rrie England. 
 
 foot-ball or cricket. In the boarding-houses a fag has 
 little more to do than bring up the kettle for his 
 master's breakfast, boil his eggs, and toast his bread — 
 which a slovenly lower- form boy is sometimes accused 
 of doing over his lamp, as the most expeditious 
 method of at least blackening it. The same services 
 are required from him at tea ; and with the excep- 
 tion of carrying an occasional message this is about 
 the amount of work wdiich an oppidan fag has to do, 
 and this only lasts until he gets into the Fifth Form, 
 which many boys do now in their first or second 
 year." 
 
 We may mention here the form of punishment in- 
 flicted on a careless fag by a Sixth Form boy which 
 is peculiar to Eton, and in all probability dates from 
 a very early period : " He sets the offender to com- 
 pose an epigram in English, Greek, or Latin, at his 
 option — usually of four lines. The amount of point 
 required from the unwilling poet appears to be in- 
 definite ; and these performances have probably suf- 
 fered considerably in this respect, since one very 
 tempting resource has been cut oif. It was usual for 
 the author to turn such w^it as he might possess 
 against the iinposer of the penalty — and, if fairly 
 done, it was held perfectly lawful ; but this kind of 
 
Eton College. 71 
 
 retaliation on tlie victim's part has long been fur- 
 bidden." 
 
 The number of pnpils enrolled at Eton is never 
 constant, but fluctuates, owing to national or local 
 causes; yet on tlie whole there has been a steady 
 and sfradual increase from the earliest time to the 
 present. The most ancient school-list in existence 
 is for the year 1678, and contains 207 names. 
 The bubble prosperity of the era of the South Sea 
 Company ran the numbers up to 425, but when the 
 speculation burst they fell back to 350. In the first 
 year of the present century the school had 530 boys, 
 and under the sway of Dr. Keate, whose reign lasted 
 longer than that of any other head-master before or 
 since — 1809-34 — the list was raised to 640. Dr. 
 Hawtrey ran it up to 777, and " the three sevens " 
 were during the decade 1847-57 a frequent toast 
 amono; Etonians. The numbers are now over 900. 
 
 Here are a few^ of the names of Etonians who rose 
 to eminence in after years : William Ewart Glad- 
 stone ; Henry Hallam, the historian ; Dean Milman ; 
 Bisliop Pearson; Winthrop Mackworth Praed ; Ed- 
 ward Bouverie Pusey; AVilliam Herbert, Dean of 
 Mancliester ; Thomas Gray, the poet ; Nathaniel For- 
 ster; Pliineas Fletcher and his brother Giles; 
 
72 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 Tlionias Do Quincey, the opium-eater ; Kinglake, the 
 liistorian of the Crimea; Henry Nelson Coleridge, 
 nepliew of Samnel Taylor Coleridge ; Henry St. 
 John, Viscount Bolingbroke ; Robert Boyle, the 
 philosopher ; the Earl of Bridge water, who founded 
 the " Bridge water Treatises ; " Jacob Bryant ; Charles 
 James Fox ; George Canning ; William Pitt, Earl of 
 Chatham ; the Duke of Wellington and his brother, 
 Lord Wellesley; Eichard Person, the marvelous 
 Greek scholar ; the poet Shelley ; Sir Robert Wal- 
 13ole, and Windham, the orator and statesman. This 
 is only a partial list, yet it contains manj of the 
 greatest names in England. 
 
 A writer in one of the English magazines says, in 
 speaking of various Eton worthies, that " the briefest 
 notice of the Etonians of the eighteenth century 
 would imply a biographical dictionary of half the 
 distinguished names in Church and State. Foremost 
 of such names should stand Horace Walpole ; sprung 
 from an Etonian family, he was all his life an Etonian 
 heart and soul. He was at Eton nearly seven years, 
 being entered at ten years old, under Bland 'as head- 
 master, in 1727, and leaving for King's College as a 
 fellow-commoner in 1734. lie made many friendships 
 there, marked by some of the fantastic romance of 
 
Eton College. Y3 
 
 liis day. Gray was there with liim — quiet and stu- 
 dious, reading Virgil for amusement in his play- 
 liours, writing graceful Latin verses, and almost as 
 fond of Eton as himself. With him and with Rich- 
 ard West and Thomas Ashton, Horace formed the 
 ' quadruple alliance ' in which, like Sir William Jones 
 and his friends at Harrow, they figured under heroic 
 names, and appear to have ruled imaginary kingdoms. 
 Walpole himself was Tydeus / Gray, Arosmades ; 
 Ashton, Plato ; and West, Almanzor. Charles James 
 Fox entered under Barnard in 1758. He was a troub- 
 lesome and irregular pupil — ' more of a mutineer than 
 a courtier,' says one of his contemporaries — yet he 
 gave out flashes of ability from time to time. He 
 had his father to thank for much irrational in- 
 dulgence ; in the middle of his Eton careef he took 
 the boy off to Paris and to Spa for four months. He 
 came back to school, as might be expected, not at 
 all improved, with all the fopperies and follies of a 
 young man. Richard Porson was a contemporary of 
 Lord Wellesley. It is more singular that the great 
 scholar should have failed to earn any remarkable 
 distinction there than that the future hero should 
 have passed unnoticed. ' They thought nothing,' 
 wrote one of his school-fellows, ' of the Norfolk boy ' 
 
74 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 (Person) who had coine tliere witli such an ahirniing 
 reputation. But Person's early training was deficient, 
 though his powers were great and his classical read- 
 ing voracious. He w^as inaccurate in his prosody — 
 a fatal defect at Eton — and his Latin verses, ahnost 
 the only road to distinction then, were never remark- 
 able. But he was a very popular boy, ready at all 
 games and clever at school-boy satire, narrowly escap- 
 ing the penalty of this dangerous gift in the shape of 
 a tremendous thrashing from Charles Simeon, who, 
 strange to say, was a fop at school. Porson addressed 
 an ode to him as ' the ugliest boy in Dr. Davies's 
 dominions;' but as he had written it with his left 
 lijuul Simeon could never bring it home to him. He 
 retained no great love for Eton in after life, perhaps 
 feeling that he had liardly his fair share of success 
 tliere. The onl}^ thing he recollected with pleasure, 
 he once said, was the rat hunting in Long Chamber! " 
 In a school of such extreme age one naturally 
 expects to find many curious and quaint customs sur- 
 viving from former years. Here is an account of 
 the "Monteni" — more properly "Ad Montem " — 
 one of the most peculiar and striking of old Eton 
 usages, which is now a thing of the past, though 
 never to be forgotten by any who liave assisted 
 
Eton College. Y5 
 
 tliereat, whether as actors or spectators. " Montem " 
 was a muster of the whole school. " in a sort of seini- 
 military array, with band and colors, to march out to 
 a mound in a field about a mile and a half distant — 
 the well-known Salt Hill — where an ensign waved 
 Iiis flag, the boys cheered, and the ceremony so far 
 was over. The professed object was to collect from 
 the crowds of visitors who were always gathered on 
 the occasion contributions of money, called salt^ to 
 supply the captain of the day, the head colleger, 
 with funds for his Cambridge expenses. For this 
 purpose two salt-bearers, usually the second in senior- 
 ity of the collegers and the captain of the oppidans, 
 assisted by some ten or twelve runners or servitors, 
 and all dressed in fancy costumes, scoured all the ap- 
 proaches to Windsor and Eton within the shire of 
 Buckingliam — for the collection of 'salt' was con- 
 fined, for some traditionary reason, to those limits — 
 and levied contributions, by a sort of civil compul- 
 sion, from every comer, from the nobleman in his 
 carriage-and-four to the rustic on foot. The cry was 
 ' Salt ! Salt ! ' for which embroidered bao^s were held 
 forth, and any thing w\as accepted, from a sixpence 
 to a lifty pound note. In return the donor received 
 a little blue ticket with a Latin motto on it — Mos 
 
76 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mp:erie England. 
 
 jpro Lege, or 3fore et Monte — and this ticket worn in 
 the hat, or otherwise shown, protected the bearer for 
 the rest of the day from any further demand." 
 
 Royalty generally graced this occasion. For nearly 
 forty years George Third was present and regularly 
 dropped " salt " to the amount of fifty pounds into 
 the bag. The origin of this peculiar school festival is 
 obscure. " The Winchester statutes (which were 
 adopted for Eton in almost every particular) made 
 provision for the out-door exercise of the scholars, by 
 a daily procession ad Montem to St. Catherine's Hill, 
 outside the city walls, which is still known as 'going 
 on hills,' and takes place there regularly on half-holi- 
 days ; and from this there can be little doubt that the 
 term itself was borrowed." 
 
 But so many abuses grew out of the old custom, 
 and so much license prevailed, that it was finally 
 abolished. Prince Albert was present at the last cel- 
 ebration, in 1844. His carriage was halted on Wind- 
 sor Bridge, and he gave the salt-bearer the royal do- 
 nation of £100. 
 
 " Since the glories of Montem have departed," says 
 the old Etonian before quoted, " the fourth of June 
 has taken its place as the great yearly festival of 
 Etonians. It was instituted in commemoration of a 
 
Eton College. 77 
 
 visit of King George Third, and is held on his birth- 
 day. It is the great trjsting day of Eton, when her 
 sons gather from far and wide, young and old, great 
 and small ; no matter who or what, so long as they 
 are old Etonians — that magic bond binds them all to- 
 gether as brothers, and levels for the time all distinc- 
 tions of age or rank. The proceedings begin with 
 speeches delivered in the upper school at 12 noon 
 before the provost, fellows, masters, and a large audi- 
 ence of the boys' friends. Selections from classical 
 authors, ancient or modern, are recited by the Sixth 
 Eorm boys, w^ho are dressed for the occasion in black 
 swallow-tail coats, white ties, black knee-breeches and 
 buckles, silk stockings and pumps. Then follows the 
 provost's luncheon, given in the college hall, to the 
 more distinguished visitors, while similar entertain- 
 ments on a smaller scale are going on in the vari- 
 ous ^ houses.' At 3 o'clock there is a full choral 
 service in chapel. At 6 P. M. all hands adjourn to 
 the Brocas, a large open meadow, to witness the great 
 event of the day — the procession of the boats to 
 Surly Hall, a public-house of that name on the right 
 bank of the river, some three and a half miles from 
 Windsor. The boats are divided into tM^o classes — 
 upper and lower. The upper division consists of the 
 
T8 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 j\lonarch^ ten-oar, the Yictory^ and the Prince of 
 ^Yales^ or, as it is more usually called, the third up- 
 per. The lower boats are the Britannia^ Dread- 
 naughty Thetis^ and St. George. Sometimes, when 
 the number of aspirants for a place is larger than 
 usual, an eighth boat, called the Defiance^ is added. 
 The collegers also put on an eight-oar. The flotilla 
 is preceded by the Eton racing eight-oar, manned by 
 the picked crew who are to contend at Putney or 
 Jleidey. Each boat has its distinctive uniform. For- 
 merly these w^ere very fanciful — Greek pirates, galley 
 slaves in silver chains, and other grotesque figui'es, 
 astounding the quiet reaches of the Thames for the 
 day. The crews of the upper boats now wear dark 
 blue jackets and trousers, and straw hats with rib- 
 bons displaying the name of the boats in gold letters. 
 The cockswains are dressed in an admiral's uniform 
 with gold fittings, sword, and cocked hat. The cap- 
 tain of each boat has an anchor and crown embroid- 
 ered in gold on the left sleeve of his jacket. In the 
 lower boats the crews wear trousers of white jean, 
 and all ornaments and embroidery are in silver. 
 Each boat carries a laro^e silk flasr in the stern. The 
 procession is headed by a quaint, old-fashioned boat, 
 (an Eton racing boat of primitive days) rowed by 
 
Eton College. 79 
 
 Thames watermen and conveying a military band. 
 The scene at Bovenly Lock is very striking, for here 
 the shells with their gay crews are massed in the nar- 
 row channel. Opposite to Surly Hall a liberal dis- 
 pkiy of good things, spread on tables on shore, awaits 
 the arrival of the crews — the Sixth Form alone beinn^ 
 accommodated with a tent. After a few toasts and 
 as much champagne as can be disposed of in a short 
 time, the captain of the boats gives the word for all 
 to re-embark, and the flotilla returns to Eton ifi the 
 sanjc order. This order, however, is by no means 
 such as would delight the eye of a critical naval 
 lieutenant — singing, shouting, racing, bumping, all 
 go on together in tlie most harmonious confusion. 
 
 " The time-honored custom of ' sitting a boat ' must 
 here claim mention. Some old Etonian of generous 
 and festive disposition (generally an ' old one ') sig- 
 nifies to the captain of a boat his intention of pre- 
 senting the crew with a certain quantity of cham- 
 pagne. In return he is entitled to be rowed up to 
 Surly in the boat to which lie presents the wine — he 
 occupies the cockswain's seat, who kneels or stands 
 behind him. This giver of good things is called from 
 this circumstance a ' sitter.' And tlie question, ' Who 
 sits your boat?' or, 'Have you a sitter?' is one of 
 
80 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 some interest wliicli may be often lieard addressed to 
 a captain. Tlie seat of honor in the ten-oar is 
 usually offered to some distinguished old Etonian. 
 Canning occupied it in 1824. The boats, after their 
 return through Windsor Bridge, turn and row two 
 or three times round an eyot in the middle of the 
 stream above the bridge. During this time a grand 
 display of fireworks takes place on the eyot. The 
 ringing of the fine old bells in the curfew tower, 
 the cheering of the crews, and the brilliant colored 
 fires which strike across the water and light up the 
 dense masses of spectators along the bridge, the 
 rafts, and the shore, produce an effect not easily for- 
 gotten." 
 
 Another curious Eton custom, of a more cruel 
 character than the Montem, and w^isely abolished at 
 a much earlier date, was the " Hunting of the Eain." 
 The college butcher was, we are told, under some 
 ancient unwritten law, obliged to provide a ram an- 
 nually to be hunted by the scholars on election Satur- 
 day. " On one occasion," says the chronicler, " the un- 
 fortunate animal swam the river, and rushed into the 
 crowded market-place at Windsor w^ith the boys in full 
 chase ; and so much mischief and confusion was the 
 consequence that the hunting was given up ; but the 
 
Eton College. 81 
 
 victim was still provided, and dispatched by a process 
 quite as cruel, and which had not even the excuse of 
 the popular excitement of a chase. After being ham- 
 strung to prevent his escape, he was knocked on the 
 head in the school-yard with clubs specially provided 
 for the occasion." 
 
 But there is still a relic of the ancient times in 
 vogue at Eton which impresses the stranger as being 
 quite as singular as either of the foregoing. This is 
 the whipping-block. Tlie ancient disciplinary instru- 
 ment was carried off by that mad prank, the late 
 Marquis of Waterford, some fifty years ago. Its 
 successor stands in the torture-chamber, but is not so 
 frequently used as the old one. The times have 
 changed, and so have the manners of Eton boys. 
 "When a culprit is to be birched he is brought hither, 
 and a call is made for First Form boys — termed "hold- 
 ers down." " The two who arrive last on the scene 
 pay the penalty of their tardiness by being required 
 to hold the offender down over the block while the 
 master administers the switching." Dr. Keate on 
 one occasion flogged more than eighty boys, which was 
 the cause of the "rape of the block" above referred 
 to. One morning a lot of offenders were sent up to 
 
 his room to be flogged, but the block had disap- 
 6 
 
82 School-Boy Life in Mkrrie England. 
 
 peared, and so had the birch. Three of the more 
 daring spirits managed to get the block out in the 
 dead of night, and shipped off to London, where for 
 a long time it was used as the seat of the President 
 of the Eton Block Club, to which nobody could be- 
 long who had not been birched three times at Eton. 
 
 From its peculiar constitution Eton is virtually 
 divided into two schools, consisting of the handful of 
 king's scholars on the one hand, and the oppidans on the 
 other. For all practical purposes, however, they are 
 one, especially when it comes to repelUng a common 
 enemy, or on the occasions of the boat-races at Hen- 
 ley or the annual cricket match at Lord's. "The 
 jealousy between collegers and oppidans," says an old 
 Etonian, 'Svas at one time very strong, and led to 
 a very repreliensible amount of ill-feeling. It seems 
 to have Jbeen at its height about thirty or forty years 
 ago. There w^as, of course, some difference of social 
 position between the tw^o classes in many individual 
 cases ; but this has never been sufficient to account of 
 itself for the superiority assumed by the oppidans; 
 for there have always been among the king's scholars 
 many boys of good and w^ell-known family. The 
 snow-balling fights between the two bodies had more 
 earnest than sport in them ; and in these the col- 
 
Eton College. 83 
 
 legers' gowns served them as shields, and gave the.u 
 a better chance of holding their own against superior 
 numbers. At present, the great struggle is at the 
 annual foot-ball match 'at the wall,' upon St. An- 
 drew's Day, between tlte picked elevens of each 
 body. In this fierce contest a good deal of spite is 
 shown — more than in the most savage days of the 
 Sixtli Form match at Rugby — and the chaff is fast 
 and furious. If the collegers gain the victory, pru- 
 dence generally counsels a retreat as soon as possible 
 into their own fastnesses (especially for the younger 
 boys, who have been cheering on their champions) in 
 order to escape vengeance from the overwhelming 
 numbers of the irate oppidans," who outnumber them 
 nearly ten to one. But on the whole the relations 
 between the two bodies have been peaceable, if not 
 very cordial, in daily intercourse, and though it is 
 still " almost a natural thing for a small oppidan to 
 dislike a small colleger," yet as the boys rise into the 
 higher forms this juv^enile trait wears off. Here, then, 
 we see the animosity of " school" and " town " raging 
 between scholars of the same school instead of, as at 
 Rugby, between the "school" and the "louts." 
 
 Eton has been peculiarly fortunate in the choice of 
 head-masters. The present incumbent, the Rev. E. 
 
84 School-Boy Life in MerPwIe England. 
 
 Warre, is the sixty-tliird in the succession, dating 
 from William Wayuflete. Among the most distin- 
 guished was Richard Coxe (1528-35), whom Cranmer 
 afterward made tutor to Edward VI. He caused 
 scandal by being the first to bring a wife to live 
 within the walls of the college. He subsequently 
 became Bishop of Ely. Nicholas Udall, his suc- 
 cessor, oddly enough, combined his collegiate duties 
 with those of stage manager to Queen Elizabeth's 
 private theatricals at Windsor ! Udall also fell under 
 the unpleasant suspicion of conspiring with two of 
 the collegers to purloin the college plate, but he 
 seems to have silenced his traducers, for he afterward 
 was promoted to be head-master of Westminster 
 School. 
 
 Dr. Barnard, who became head-master in 1754, is 
 famed as the most spirited and successful master of 
 the eighteenth century. He it was who " birched 
 the conceit out of Charles James Fox," and put down 
 foppery among the boys by cutting off their cues and 
 forbidding the wearing of ruffled shirts. Dr. Joseph 
 Goodall, whose sway began in 1801, ruled the school 
 for nine years, and then became provost for thirty 
 years more. The income of the head-master of Eton 
 is not less than $15,000 a year. 
 
Eton College. 85 
 
 A list of tlie provosts and masters from the foun- 
 dation to the present, with other matter, will be 
 found at the conclusion of this chapter. 
 
 "Anecdotes of Keate's day abound in all Eton mem- 
 ories. Practical jokes were more common then than 
 now, and there was perhaps an additional enjoyment 
 of them by Keate's pupils from the certain explosion 
 of rage which they called forth from him when dis- 
 covered. A young nobleman, disguised in an old 
 gown and cocked-hat, so as to present by moonlight a 
 passable likeness of the Doctor, painted Keate's door 
 a bright red one night before the eyes of the college 
 watchman, who stood looking on at a respectful dis- 
 tance, wondering what the Doctor could be at, but 
 not daring to question his right to do as he pleased 
 with his own. Among other forbidden indulgences 
 in the school Keate had thought proper to include 
 umbrellas, which he regarded as signs of modern ef- 
 feminacy. Boys are perverse ; and when to the com- 
 fort of an umbrella was added the spice of unlawful- 
 ness it became a point of honor with some of the 
 larger boys to carry one. The Doctor harangued his 
 own division on the subject in his bitterest style, and 
 ended by expressing his regret that Etonians had de- 
 generated into school-girls. The next night a party 
 
86 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 made an expediLioii to the neigliboring village of 
 Upton, took down a large board inscribed in smart 
 gilt letters, ' Seminary for Young Ladies,' and fixed 
 it up over the great west entrance into the school- 
 yard, where it met Keate's angry eyes in the morn- 
 ing. He had also declared war against a fashion, 
 creeping in a]nong the swells of those days, of sport- 
 ing-cut coats and breeches with brass buttons, which 
 he denounced as against the statutes. One morning 
 several boys appeared in school in knee-breeches ex- 
 temporized out of flannel, which they defended as 
 strictly statutable. 
 
 " But few stories of that day are complete without 
 a flogging. It is said that on one occasion, when a 
 confirmation was to be held for the school, each 
 master was requested to make out and send in a list 
 of candidates in his own foi'ni. One of them wrote 
 down the names on the first piece of paper which 
 came to hand, which happened unluckily to be one 
 of the slips, of well-known size and shape, used as 
 flogging-bills, and sent up regularly with the names 
 of delinquents for execution. The list was put into 
 Keate's hands without explanation ; he sent for the 
 boys in the regular course, and in spite of all pro- 
 testations on their part, pointing to the master's 
 
Eton College. 87 
 
 signature to the fatal bill, tlogged them all (so the 
 story goes) there and then. Another day a culprit 
 who was due for punishment could not be found, 
 and the Doctor was kept waiting on the scene of 
 action for some time in a state of considerable exas- 
 peration. In an evil moment for hiuiself a name- 
 sake of the defaulter passed the door ; he was seized 
 at once by Keate's order, and brought to the block 
 as a vicarious sacrifice ! Such legends may not 
 always bear the strictest investigation, but they 
 have at least the sort of truth which some Eo- 
 manist writers claim for certain apocryphal Acta 
 Sanctoricm — they show what sort of deeds were 
 done." * 
 
 The sports in vogue at Eton are rowing, cricket, 
 foot-ball, and fives — named in the order of their 
 present popularity. Boating has for many genera- 
 tions been one of the most popular amusements, the 
 site affording facilities which no other public school 
 save Westminster can boast. Swimming, too, has 
 long held an honored place among Eton accomplish- 
 ments. Out of the fact that Eton and Westminster 
 are the only two schools situated on a noble river 
 grew up a rivalry in rowing that extended also to 
 
 * Eioninna, Ancient and Modern, Lucas Collins. 
 
88 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 scholarship, and there is always more or less emulation 
 between the schools. 
 
 '' Modern Eton has gone far afield, and its sons are 
 seen and their merry laugh is heard over all the sur- 
 rounding counti'y. Up the river, nearly as far as 
 Maidenhead, the stream is covered with their boats, 
 and nearer to Eton the banks swarm with their naked 
 forms as they take ' headers ' or ' f ootei's ' into the 
 water. The fields which surround the school, hap- 
 pily for Etonians, are all common land, and are ap- 
 propriated for foot-ball in winter and for cricket in 
 summer, as these tw^o games have far outgrown the 
 space originally ^^rovided for tliem in tlie playing 
 fields. The roads echo to the tread of the Eton Yol- 
 unteers, the fields are scoured by the beagles and 
 huntsmen of the Eton College Hunt, and a fellow 
 of three hundred years ago would find it hard to rec- 
 ognize, in the free and active crowd who have seized 
 upon the surrounding country for their amusements, 
 the close-guarded knot of students who were confined 
 strictly to the college grounds." 
 
 During the summer iialf-year, says an old Etonian, 
 " cricket is a formidable rival to the attractions of the 
 river. Like rowing, it requires a good deal of time 
 and practice, and few boys excel in both. In fact, 
 
Eton College. 89 
 
 the school is divided into Wet-bobs and Diy-bobs, as 
 they are called, the former devoting themselves to 
 the boats and the latter to the playing fields. Of 
 course, a Dry-bob boats occasionally, and a Wet-bob 
 plays cricket for amusement, but each lays himself 
 out for excellence in his special line. Apart from 
 cricket and foot-ball, the only game now recognized 
 is fives. The more juvenile amusements have long 
 been voted beneath the dignity of a public -school 
 boy — a fastidiousness of taste which does not, per- 
 haps, increase the happiness of the little boys. They 
 played marbles at Eton as late as 1821, and tops 
 survived many years longer, being regularly intro- 
 duced for some ten days after the return of the school 
 from the summer holidays until about 1835." But 
 these " baby games " are now tabooed. 
 
 The game of " fives " — a species of hand-ball, 
 though resembling in some features the game of 
 tennis as anciently played — is peculiar to Eton, and 
 its origin is both curious and interesting. The game 
 lias been played in England and France since the 
 ourteenth century, and is so named from the fact 
 that three fives^ or fifteen^ are counted as making 
 game. The spot where fives is played at Eton is 
 where the steps from the school chapel descend into 
 
90 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 the " quad," and come down on a broad landing- 
 place, to the left of which is one of the bays between 
 the buttresses anciently intended to support the stone 
 groined roof of the chapel. The balustrade on one 
 side of the staircase here comes to an abrupt end, and 
 below the step where it finishes is the hole of a drain. 
 '' In this space, so curiously defined by mere accident, 
 the game known as ' Eton fives ' has grown up, 
 and wherever else that game is played the same pe- 
 culiarities are faithfully reproduced. There is also a 
 string-course on a slope, which has some effect on the 
 chances of the ball, and each one of these peculiarities 
 must be copied with the utmost nicety unless the 
 game is to be a failure." At Rugby and at Oxford 
 fives courts have been constructed similar in every 
 respect to the parent court at Eton. 
 
 Eton was the first public school to start a magazine 
 of its own — The Microcosm.^ founded in 1786. But 
 it lived only two years, and not till sixteen years 
 later did its successor appear — The Miniature. It 
 too was short-lived. But in 1821 The Etonian came, 
 and came to stay for several years. Then there were 
 The Eton Miscellany^ The Oppidan^ and many 
 others. The columns of all of these, of course, were 
 filled by the boys themselves, and many a pen after- 
 
Eton College. 91 
 
 ward famous was Urst employed in these youtliful 
 literary enterprises. Foremost among these young 
 journalists in recent years were Praed, H. N. Cole- 
 ridge, Gladstone, Hallam, and Doyle. 
 
 " Too many Etonians of the highest promise," says 
 Mr. Collins, '* have passed away before their full devel- 
 opment. Foremost of these is Winthrop Mackworth 
 Praed, who died at the early age of thirty-seven, and 
 whose name is even now less generally honored than 
 it deserves to be. Many of his poems have a grace 
 and beauty which have never been surpassed by any 
 English writer, while his personal character, both in 
 boyhood and in manhood, made him as warinly loved 
 by those who knew him as he was admired for the 
 brilliancy of his powers. But Praed's sun went down 
 in its brightness. 
 
 " It was not so with one of his fellow Etonian 
 writers of perhaps even greater ability, though of 
 less attractive personal qualities. William Sydney 
 Walker, Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, one 
 of the most remarkable among Eton's many wonder- 
 ful scholars, has left even less of a popular name 
 and far more melancholy recollections behind him. 
 Possibly the very precocity of his genius in boyhood 
 was either the symptom or the cause of that morbid 
 
92 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 mental excitement which made his life a useless one. 
 Before he was sent to Eton he liad read history ex- 
 tensively at live years old. At Eton the feats of gen- 
 ius recorded of him would seem quite as apocryphal 
 if they were not formally vouched for by living wit- 
 nesses. He could repeat the whole of Homer, Hor- 
 ace, and Yii-gil by heart, says an Eton witness before 
 the Royal Connnission ; and not only that, but he 
 could be called up in school, having an English 
 Shakespeare in his hand instead of the proper book, 
 and take up a lesson anywhere that it might be going 
 on ; he could construe a passage expression by expres- 
 sion, parse it word by w^ord, answer any question that 
 was asked him, and afterward sit dow^n to his Shakes- 
 peare. 
 
 " Some one once told Sir James Mackintosh that 
 Walker could turn any thing into Greek verse. Sir 
 James proposed a page of the Court Guide, and it 
 was done. To such a boy, of course, the usual pen- 
 alties of lines from a Greek or Latin poet to learn by 
 heart were no punishments at all ; so that when his 
 peculiar powers had been once discovered Greek 
 verses were set him instead. He had many of the 
 unpleasant habits of genius — slovenly, absent, ill- 
 tempered, awkward, and odd, he was not happy at 
 
Eton College. 93 
 
 Eton. He was the subject of considerable bullying 
 in those days of rougher school-life, and would some- 
 times even rush into the masters' rooms to escape 
 from his tormentors. It has been said that these 
 boyish sufferings injured his health and broke his 
 spirit, and that much of the mental unhappiness of 
 his after life was the consequence." 
 
 Eton College is essentially the seminary for the 
 sons of the nobility and gentry of England. In this 
 respect it outdoes Harrow. But though the tone of 
 the school and the somewhat expensive mode of living 
 in vogue among the oppidans virtually prohibit the 
 sons of poor parents from entering there, unless as 
 king's scholars, yet the social atmosphere is healthy, 
 free from snobbery and toadyism, and somewhat 
 democratic. 
 
 To hecome an Etonian is the ambition of many an 
 English lad ; to he an Etonian, the scholars themselves 
 think, with that pride and belief in " Ours " which is 
 such an incentive and aid to esprit de corps, is all that 
 a boy can desire ; to have heen an Etonian, and a 
 credit to the school, is often a passport to success in 
 manhood, and a never-failing source of pleasant 
 memories. 
 
94 
 
 bClIOOL- 
 
 Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
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Eton College. 
 
 95 
 
 PBOVOSTS OF ETON COLLEGE SINCE THE EOUNDA- 
 'i'lON. 
 
 Henry Sever 1441 
 
 William Wayntlete 1442 
 
 John Clerk 1447 
 
 William Westbury 1447 
 
 Henry Bost 1477 
 
 Eoger Lupton 1503 
 
 Robert Aldricli, or Aldridge 1536 
 
 Sir Thomas Smith, Kt 1547 
 
 Henry Cole 1554 
 
 William Bill 1559 
 
 WilU.mDay 1561 
 
 Sir Henry Savile, Kt 1596 
 
 Thomas Murray 1621 
 
 Sir Henry Wotlon, Kt 1624 
 
 Richard Stewart 1639 
 
 Francis Rous 1643 
 
 Nicholas Lockyer 1658 
 
 Nicholas Monk, brother of 
 celebrated General, after- 
 ward Duke of Albemarle. 1660 
 
 John Meredith 1661 
 
 Richard AUestree 1665 
 
 Zacharias Cradock 1680 
 
 Henry Godolphin 1695 
 
 Henry Bland 1.732 
 
 Stephen Sleech 1746 
 
 Edward Barnard 1765 
 
 William Hay ward Roberts. 1781 
 
 Jonathan Da vies 1791 
 
 Joseph Goodall 1809 
 
 Francis Hodgson 1840 
 
 Edward Craven Hawtrey. . 1853 
 
 Charles Old Goodford 1862 
 
 James John Hoinby 1884 
 
 HEAD-MASTERS OF ETON FROM 1660. 
 
 Tliomas Montague 1660 
 
 John Roswell 1672 
 
 Charles Roderick 1682 
 
 John Newboroiigh 1693 
 
 Andrew Snape 1713 
 
 Henry Bland 1720 
 
 William George 1728 
 
 AVilliam Cooke 1743 
 
 John Sumner 1745 
 
 Edward Barnard 1754 
 
 John Foster 1765 
 
 Jonathan Davies 1773 
 
 George Heath 1792 
 
 Joseph Goodall 1802 
 
 JolmKeate 1809 
 
 Edward Craven Hawtrey. . 1834 
 
 Charles Old Goodford 1853 
 
 Edward Balston 1862 
 
 James John Hornby 1868 
 
 Edmond Warro 1 884 
 
06 
 
 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 LO^WER MASTERS OF ETON FROM 1660. 
 
 Jolm Price 
 
 Thomas Home. . 
 Robert Young. . . 
 Richard Marty n. 
 
 1660 
 
 1663 
 
 1670 
 
 1672 
 
 Charles Roderick 1676 
 
 John Newborough 1682 
 
 Stephen Weston 1693 
 
 Thomas Carter 1 705 
 
 Barnham Goode 1717 
 
 John Sumner 1734 
 
 Tliomas Dampier 1745 
 
 Henry Sleech 1767 
 
 William Laugford 
 
 John Keate 
 
 George Thackeray , 
 
 Tiiomas Carter 
 
 Charles Yonge 
 
 Henry Hart ipp Knapp. . . , 
 
 George Jolm Dupuis 
 
 Richard Okes , 
 
 Edward Coleridge , 
 
 William Adolphus Carter. . 
 Francis Edward Durnford, 
 James Leigh Joynes 
 
 1775 
 1802 
 1809 
 1814 
 1829 
 1830 
 1834 
 1838 
 1850 
 1857 
 1864 
 1878 
 
ST. PAUL'S SCHOOL 
 
 il^otto : 
 
 "DOCE, DISCE, AUT DISCEDE." 
 7 
 
St. Paulas School 
 
 NDER the shadow of Sir 
 Christopher Wren's cathedral 
 stands one of those famons 
 Free Schools wliose founding 
 marked the revival of learning 
 England which signalized the earl}'' 
 years of the sixteenth century. Its founder 
 was Dr. John Colet, Dean of St. Paul's 
 Cathedral, who endowed the institution in 
 1512 for 153 boys " of every nation, country, and 
 class," in memory of the number of fishes taken by 
 Peter.* But there are now 500 boys at the school, 
 besides 900 other scholars elsewhere. 
 
 Tlie founder of St. Paul's School ordained that 
 each boy was to pay "once for ever " four pence when 
 admitted to the institution, which sum was to be 
 given to the '^ poor scholar " who swept the school 
 
 * John xxi, 11. 
 
100 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 and kept the seats clean. " The hours of study were 
 to be from seven until eleven in the morning, from 
 one till live in the afternoon, with prayers morning, 
 noon, and night." Another stipulation was that the 
 pupils must never use tallow candles, but only wax 
 ones, and these at the cost of their friends. It was 
 further ordained that on Childermas Day the Pauli- 
 cians were to attend the neighboring cathedral and 
 hear a sermon by the boy-bishop, and each one was 
 to make offering of a penny to the little preacher. 
 
 The custom of choosing a boy from a cathedral 
 choir on St. Nicholas Day, the sixth of December, as 
 a mock bishop, was a very ancient and wide-spread 
 custom. The boy possessed episcopal honor and dig- 
 nity for three weeks, and the rest of the choir were 
 his prebends. If he died during his prelacy he was 
 buried with pontifical honors. The odd observance 
 doubtless had reference to our Saviour's sitting in the 
 temple among the doctors when a boy. The custom 
 gave rise to many abuses, and was finally abolished in 
 1542 by Henry Eighth. 
 
 The first buildings were erected about 1509-12. 
 It seems to have been a magnificent structure for 
 those days and the use to which it was to be put. 
 The school-room was divided by a curtain, as at West- 
 
St. Paul's School. 101 
 
 minster. Over the head-master's chair was a statue 
 of the Holy Child in the act of teaching, which all 
 the scholars saluted with a hymn on going and return- 
 ing. Every class had a seat a little higher than the 
 others, which was reserved for the head-boy. This 
 early building shared the fate of Mei'chant Taylors' 
 school in the great fire of 1666, being totally de- 
 stroyed. 
 
 It was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren in 1670, 
 and stood until 1824, when it was pulled down, and 
 the noble pile was erected which still serves the 
 purposes for which it was built. But the needs of 
 the institution calling for more space, a site was 
 purchased at West Kensington in 1878, whereat a 
 modern school for 500 boys and a high school for 
 400 girls were instituted. 
 
 Over the master's seat in the old school is the 
 legend, Intendas animum studiis et rebus honestis, 
 and over the entrance to the room is the motto, Doce^ 
 Disce, aut Discede, which is also found at Win- 
 chester and other public schools. 
 
 St. Paul's is wholly a day-school. There are con- 
 sequently no dormitories, and no fagging, in this lat- 
 ter respect resembling Merchant Taylors'. The 
 modern hours of study are not so long as those pre- 
 
102 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 scribed by the founder, being now limited to six 
 daily— from 9 A. M. till 1 P. M., and from 2 to 4 
 P. M. The dinner hour occurs between 1 and 2, 
 and there are quarter-hour intermissions between the 
 various classes. 
 
 Being restricted for space, the opportunities for 
 games and sports at the city school are extremely lim- 
 ited. The playground is a paved cloister under the 
 school-room, 67 feet by 34. The Kensington school 
 is much better off in this respect, and on Saturdays 
 and half holidays the boys play cricket at Kensington 
 Oval, the governors paying a handsome sum yearly 
 for the privilege. 
 
 The school is in session about forty weeks in the 
 year. The chief absences are six weeks at midsum- 
 mer, four weeks at Christmas, and a week at Whit- 
 suntide. Tliere are also holidays on Shrove Tuesday, 
 Ash Wednesday, the Queen's birthday, Coronation 
 Day, Founder's Day, the Fifth of November (Guy 
 Fawkes Day) and Lord Mayor's Day, (November 
 9th). 
 
 There are one or two curious customs at St. Paul's 
 deserving of mention. 
 
 As has been said, there is no fagging, and the 
 monitors or prefects (the whole of the eighth class) 
 
St. Paul's School. 103 
 
 have no power to inflict punishment, their sole power 
 being to stand a boy in the middle of the room so 
 that the master's attention may be drawn to him. 
 The masters alone may inflict punishment, which 
 must never exceed a hundred lines of an imposition, 
 nor six blows with a cane upon tlie hand. 
 
 " On occasions when the sovereigns of England or 
 other royal or distinguished persons pass in state 
 through the " city," a balcony is erected in front of 
 St. Paul's School, whence addresses from the scholars 
 are presented to the illustrious visitors by the head 
 boys. The origin of this right or custom of the 
 Paulicians is not known, but is of some antiquity. 
 Addresses were so presented to Charles Fifth and 
 Henry Eighth, in 1552, to Queen Elizabeth, in 1558, 
 and to Queen Victoria, when the Royal Exchange 
 was opened in 1844. Her majesty, however, pre- 
 ferred to receive the address at the next levee, and 
 this precedent was followed w^hen the multitudes of 
 London rushed to welcome the Prince of Wales and 
 Princess Alexandra in 1863. 
 
 "A pleasing trait in the character of Samuel 
 Pepys" (who was a Paulician), says Mr. Staunton, " is 
 his attachment to St. Paul's School. On the 9th 
 January, 1059, we find him ' up early to look over 
 
104 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 and correct his brother John's speech for tlie next 
 Apposition.' On the Yth of the succeeding Feb- 
 ruary he visits the school, ' where he that made tlie 
 speech for the seventh form in praise of the Founder 
 did shew a book which Mr. Crumhim [Cromlehohne] 
 liad lately got, which he believed to be of the 
 Founder's own writing. My brother John,' records 
 Pepys affectionately, ^ came off as well as any of the 
 rest in the speeches.' He notes continually his acci- 
 dental meetings, or set drinking parties, with his old 
 school-fellows, and having recorded a visit ' in the 
 Lord Admiral's coach to Mercers' Hall,' 22d January, 
 1661, adds, ' It pleased me much to come in this 
 condition to this place, where I was once a petitioner 
 for my exhibition in Paul's School.' On the 23d 
 December in the same year, ' Lighting at my book- 
 seller's, in St. Paul's churchyard, I met there wdth 
 Mr. Crumlum and the second master of Paul's 
 School, and thence I took them to "The Starr," and 
 there we sat and talked,' etc. Pepys here promised 
 his old preceptor to make a present to the school of 
 any book he would choose up to the value of 5Z., and 
 in performance of this engagement paid about 
 twelve months later '4Z. 10^. for Stephen's 
 Thesaurus Grcecce Liiigum, given to Paul's School.' 
 
St. Paul's School. 105 
 
 On the following 4tli February (1662), lie records, 
 'To Paules Schoole, it being Apposition-day there. 
 I heard some of their speeches, and they were just 
 as school-boys used to be, of the seven liberal sciences, 
 but I think not so good as ours were in our time.' 
 After a short business call in the neighborhood, 
 ' back again to Paul's Schoole, and went up to see 
 the head forms posed in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew ; 
 but I think they do not answer in any so well as we 
 did, only in geography they did pretty well. . . . 
 So down to the School, where Mr. Crumlum did me 
 much honour by telling many what a present I had 
 made to the School, showing my Stephanus in four 
 volumes. He also showed us, upon my desire, an old 
 edition of the grammar of Colett's, where his epistle 
 to the children is very pretty ; and in rehearsing the 
 Creed it is said, " borne of the cleane Virgin Mary." 
 On the dth February, 1663-4, Pepys went once 
 more " To Paul's Schoole, and up to hear the upper 
 form examined ; and there was kept by very many of 
 tlie Mercers, Clutterbucke, Barker, Harrington, and 
 tilers, and with great respect used by all, and had a 
 noble dinner.' On 9th March, 1665, Pepys was 
 again ' at Paul's Schoole, where,' he adds, ' I visited 
 Mr. Crumlum at his house, and Lord ! to see how 
 
106 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 ridiculous a conceited pedagogue lie is, though a 
 learned man, he being so dogmatical in all he do and 
 says. But among other discourse we fell to the old 
 discourse of Paule's Schoole, and he did, upon mj 
 declaring my value of it, give me one of Lilly's 
 grammars of a very old impression, as it was in the 
 Catholique times, which I shall much set by.' 
 During the great fire of London, 2d-7tli September, 
 1666, our diarist 'saw all the towne burned, and a 
 miserable sight of PauFs Church, with all the roofs 
 fallen, and the body of the quire fallen into St. 
 Fayths; Paul's School also, Ludgate and Fleet 
 Street.' " 
 
 John Milton — patriot, scholar, and poet — was born 
 in Bread Street, within a few yards of the school 
 that "made a man of him," and he sleeps his last 
 sleep almost beneath the shadow of the cathedral's 
 dome, in the chancel of the parish church of St. 
 Giles, Cripplegate. 
 
 To Americans St. Paul's School must possess pe- 
 culiar interest from the fact that it was the place 
 where the unfortunate Major Andre was educated. 
 None of the great public schools possess a greater 
 honor list of noted names. " On the long and brill- 
 iant array of Paulicians we find William Whitaker, 
 
St. Paul's School. 107 
 
 one of the earliest champions of the Reforniatiuii ; 
 William Camden, the antiquarian, who in 1592 be- 
 came Head-master of Westminster School ; the im- 
 mortal John Milton ; Samuel Pepys, the quaint and 
 witty diarist ; the great Duke of Marlborough ; Hal- 
 ley, the famous astronomer; Sir Philip Francis, by 
 many thought to be the author of the Letters of 
 Junius ; and the eminent Greek scholar, Benjamin 
 Jowett." Surely such an array of names as the 
 foregoing is sufficient glory for any foundation ; but 
 tiiere are scores of others only second in fame to 
 these w^orthies, among whom are no less than ^nq 
 bishops. 
 
 After the great fire of London the school was for 
 some time held in a private house until the school 
 edifice could be rebuilt. As will be remembered, St. 
 Paul's Cathedral was razed to the ground to give 
 place to the noble structure designed by Sir Chris- 
 topher Wren. The massive stones which had been 
 uninjured by the fire were used in constructing many 
 buildings in the vicinity and even for paving some of 
 the streets, and the new St. Paul's School had many 
 of these sacred stones incorporated in its walls. This 
 edifice stood for over two hundred years. But the 
 site was immensely valuable for trade purposes, and 
 
108 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 unfortunately, witliin the past few years the old 
 site of St. Paul's School has been covered with a 
 block of business houses, and the school removed to 
 other quarters. 
 
Shrewsbury Grammar School, 
 
 iWotto : 
 
 "INTUS SI RECTE, NE LABORA." 
 
Shrewsbury Grammar School. 
 
 O early as the days of the ancient 
 Britons there was a town, named 
 Pengwern, on the site of the 
 city of Shrewslniry. The Ro- 
 mans called the place Uriconinm, 
 ^^ a Latinized rendering of the British 
 name of the near-by hill, Wrekin. The 
 , Saxon invaders, under Offa of Mercia, in 
 / their turn, translated the name into 
 Schrobbes-byrig, " hill of Shrubs," which has survived 
 to the present in the name of Shrewsbury. So we 
 see that the town boasts of an antiquity of at least 
 fifteen hundred years, and was probably coeyal with 
 the time of Christ. 
 
 In the time of Alfred the Great, Shrew^sbury 
 ranked as one of the chief cities of England ; and in 
 1403 the memorable battle which resulted in the 
 defeat of Hotspur and Douglas by Henry IV. was 
 fought under its walls. Up to the year 6S5 Peng- 
 
112 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 wern was the capital of Fowls, King of the Welsh. 
 The Normans, " whose nicer ears were offended at 
 the rugged harshness of the Teutonic name," softened 
 it into Salopesbury, whence the town is often called 
 Salop to this day, and the county Shropshire is known 
 as the shire of Salop. 
 
 " The picturesque appearance of Shrewsbury, from 
 whatever side we approach it," says Mr. Staunton, 
 " the beauty of its situation and surrounding scenery, 
 with the richness of its historical associations, com- 
 bine to render it one of the most interesting of 
 English towns. Shrewsbury is built upon the slopes 
 and summit of a gentle eminence, rising from the 
 plain of north Shropshire, and formed by one of the 
 windings of * swift Severn ' into a peninsula, the 
 neck of which on the north-east side is not more than 
 three hundred yards in breadth. Beyond these 
 limits it throws out three long suburbs — the Abbey 
 Foregate, over the English Bridge, stretching to the 
 south-east and south ; Frankwell, beyond the Welsh 
 Bridge, to the north-west and west ; and the Castle 
 Foregate, extending north and north-east from the 
 narrow lane called Castle-gates, which, running under 
 the castle, traverses the neck of land before men- 
 tioned." 
 
Shrewsbury Grammar School. 113 
 
 E'early three centuries and a half have passed 
 since the worthy Shrewsbury burgesses determined 
 to found a free school in the shire town. At Mich- 
 aelmas, 1549, they petitioned the young King Ed- 
 ward YI. for a grant of certain estates then vacant 
 for the endowment of the school. Their prayer was 
 granted, and thus was founded the " Free Grammar 
 School of King Edward the Sixth." But ere the insti- 
 tution was opened the young king died, and Queen 
 Mary allowed the charter to lie dormant, or else the 
 burgesses of Shrewsbury deemed the time unfavorable 
 to the success of their plan. In 1562, however, four 
 years after good Queen Bess had come to the throne, 
 the school was opened with a large list of pupils on 
 its roster, and almost at once took rank among the 
 great schools of England. 
 
 At the time of the endowment the revenues 
 amounted to £98 8^. Zd.; but in 1880 the yearly 
 value was near £3,500. The income of the head- 
 master is about £2,000 = $10,000 ; not a large sum 
 when we remember the great emoluments of the 
 masters of Eton, Harrow, or Kugby. 
 
 Shrewsbury School occupies a commanding site on 
 the northern ridge of the " Hill of Shrubs," and is of 
 rather imposing Tudor architecture. The main school 
 
114 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 is of stone, and dates from 1630, when it took the 
 place of the original wooden structure. Over the 
 gate is an inscription in Greek setting forth the 
 axiom, " If you are fond of learning j'ou will be 
 learned," and the two statues flanking the gate, one 
 of a scholar and the other of a graduate of the seven- 
 teenth century, stand respectively for "Fond of 
 learnino;" and ''Learned." Beneath the central 
 window is the escutcheon of Charles I. The main 
 school-room occupies the whole of the upper story ; 
 its windows are those in the higher range. The lower 
 school occupies the basement, and in its w^indovvs are 
 oaken boards or tablets on which are carved the 
 names of distinguished scholars. The pointed win- 
 dows in the tower are those of the library. The 
 chapel and the library date from 1595. 
 
 There are between two and three hundred boys at 
 Shrewsbury, of whom about eighty are sons of bur- 
 gesses, and as such entitled to a free education. The 
 boys are graded among the following forms : 
 
 Sixth Fotim : Fourth Form : 
 
 Three divisions. Two divisions. 
 
 Fifth Form : Third Form : 
 
 Two divisions. Two divisions. 
 
 The Shell : Second Form. 
 
 Two divisions. First Form, 
 
Shrewsbury Grammar School. 115 
 
 While the course of study at Shrewsbury is much 
 the same as that pursued at any other of the 
 great pubhc schools, marked attention is paid to 
 classical work, and the success which Shrewsburys 
 have attained at the universities and in public life 
 is a proof of their thorough training and mental 
 discipline. 
 
 In one or two other respects, however, the 
 school on Severn's bank is peculiar. The monitors 
 have no executive powers — that is, they may not 
 punish a boy or take the law in their own hands 
 upon the slightest occasion. They stand as inter- 
 mediaries between the scholars and the masters, 
 and all requests from the one and commands from 
 the others are transmitted through the monitors. 
 Tliei'e are twelve of these praepostors, who obtain 
 their rank by dint of superior excellence in study. 
 " They are privileged to wear hats, to carry a 
 stick, to go beyond the school precincts, and to 
 go home at holiday time a day sooner than the 
 others.'' 
 
 Fagging as practiced at other schools is wholly 
 unknown at Shrewsbury. Four fags are allotted to 
 the praepostors, and are supposed to get breakfast 
 and run messages for them, etc., but these four fags 
 
116 School-Buy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 are changed every week, and there is no school 
 lagging. 
 
 Impositions, flogging, and expulsion are the pun- 
 ishments in vogue. The Sixth Form is exempt from 
 flogging, and when applied it must be by the head- 
 master, and not oftener than six times in the half- 
 year to the same culprit. 
 
 The ancient statutes enjoin that tlie school sports 
 shall consist of " shooting in the long bow and chess 
 play, and no other games, unless it be running, 
 wrestling, or leaping," while every Thursday the 
 boys w^ere to "declaim and play one act of a com- 
 edy." Nowadays, however, the favorite sports are 
 cricket, fives, football, rowing, quoits, and hare and 
 hounds. 
 
 In eminent names the annals of old Shrewbury are 
 rich. First and foremost comes that of Sir Philip 
 Sidney, " the English Petrarch," and may be followed 
 by that of his noble kinsman Lord Brooke, whose 
 curious epitaph runs thus : *' Fulke Grevill, servant 
 to Queene Elizabeth, Counceller to King James, and 
 Frend to Sir Philip Sidne}^" Then came a galaxy 
 of great and learned and pious churchmen — Thomp- 
 son, Archbishop of York ; Bowers, Bishop of Chich- 
 ester; Thomas, Bishop in succession of St. Asaph, 
 
Shkewsbury Gkammar School. 117 
 
 Lincoln, and Salisbury ; Scott, master of Balliol ; 
 Cradock, of Brasenose ; Archdeacons Wilson. Evans, 
 France, Crawley, Foulkes, and Cobbold. In the 
 realm of letters we meet Sir John Harrington, Sir 
 Edwin Sandys and his brother George Sandys, and 
 James Harrington, Wycherly, Ambrose Phillips, 
 John Taylor, Shilleto, Basil Jones, and Smart Hughes, 
 the traveler and historian. 
 
 There is yet extant a letter from Sir Henry Sidney 
 to his son Philip while the latter was at Shrewbury, 
 w^hich for its quaint diction, rare kindliness, and wise 
 counsel is worthy of reproduction here. 
 
 " Sonne Philip^ I haue receiued two letters from 
 you, the one written in Latine, the other in French, 
 which I take in good parte, and will you to exercise 
 that practise of learning often, for it will stand you in 
 most steed in that profession of lyfe that you are borne 
 to line. And now sithence this is my first letter that 
 euer I did write to you, T will not that it be all 
 empty of some aduices, which my naturall care of 
 you prouoketh me to wish you to follow, as docu- 
 mentes to you in this your tender age. Let your first 
 action be the lifting vp of your minde to Almighty 
 God by hartie praier, and feelingly digest the wordes 
 
118 School-Boy Lifk in Meerie England. 
 
 you speak in praier with contirmall meditation, and 
 thinking of him to whom you pray and vse this as an 
 ordinarie, and at an ordinarie houre, whereby the 
 time it selfe will put you in remembrance to doo 
 that thing which you are accustomed to doo in that 
 time. 
 
 Apply your studie such houres as your discreet 
 Master doth assigne you earnestly, and the time I 
 know hee will so limit as shalbe both sufficient for 
 your learning, yea and salfe for your health; and 
 marke the sence and matter of that you doo reade 
 as well as the words, so shall you both eni-ich your 
 tongue with wordes, and your wit with matter, and 
 iudgement wil grow, as yeares groweth in you. Be 
 humble and obedient to your master, for vnlesse you 
 frame your self to obey others, yea and feele in your 
 selfe what obedience is, you shal neuer be able to 
 teach others how to obey you. Be courteous of gest- 
 ure, and affable vnto all men, with diuersitie of reuer- 
 ence according to the dignitie of the person, there is 
 nothing that winneth so much with so little cost, vse 
 moderate diet, so as after your meale you may find 
 your wit fresher and not more duller, and your body 
 more liuely and not more heauie, seldome drinke 
 wine, and yet sometimes do, least being inforced 
 
ShuewoBL'ky GKA:.i:,iA.ii Sch.)ol. 119 
 
 to drinke vpon tlie sudden you should iiiid your selfe 
 inflamed, vse exercise of bodie, but such as is without 
 perill of your bones, or ioints, it will increase your 
 force and enlarge your breath, delite to bee cleanly 
 aswell in all parts of your body as in your garments, 
 it shall make you gratefull in each company and oth- 
 erwise lothsome, giue your selfe to be merie, for you 
 degenerate from your father if you find not your selfe 
 most able in wit and bodie, to do any thing when 
 you be most merie, but let your mirth be euer void 
 of all scurrillitie and biting words to any man, for an 
 wound giuen by a worde is oftentimes harder to bee 
 cured then that which is giuen with the sword : be 
 you rather a hearer and bearer away of other mens 
 talke, then a beginner or procurer of spech, otherwise 
 you shalbe accompted to delite to heare your self 
 speake. 
 
 Be modest in ech assemblie, and rather be re- 
 buked of light felowes for maidenlike shamefastnes, 
 then of your sad friends for peart boldnes : think 
 vpon eury worde that you will speake before you ntter 
 it, and remember liow nature hath rampered vp as it 
 were the tongue with teeth, lips, yea and haire without 
 the lips, and all betokening rames and bridles to the 
 lesse vse of that member; aboue all things tell no 
 
120 School Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 vntrutli, no not in trifles, tlie custome of it is nought : 
 And let it not satisfie you that the hearers for a time 
 take it for a truth, yet after it will be knowne as it is 
 to your shame, for there cannot be a greater reproch 
 to a Gentleman than to be accompted a Iyer. Study 
 and endeuour your selfe to be vertuously occupied, so 
 shall you make such an h^tbite of well doing in you, 
 as you shall not know how to do euill though you 
 would : 
 
 Remember my Sonne the Noble bloud you are 
 discended of by your mothers side, and thinke that 
 oidy by vertuous life and good action, you may be an 
 ornament to that ylustre family, and otherwise 
 through vice and sloth you may be accompted Lahes 
 generis, a spot of your kin, one of the greatest cursses 
 that can happen to man. Well my little Phillip^ 
 this is enongh for me and I feare to much for you, 
 but yet if I finde that this light meat of digestion do 
 nourish any thing the weake stomack of your yoong 
 capacitie, 1 will as I finde the same grow stronger, 
 feede it with tougher food. Commend mee most 
 liartily vnto Maister Justice Corbet, old Master 
 Onslowe, and my Coosin his sonne. Farewell, your 
 mother and I send you our blessings, and Almighty 
 God graunt you his, nourish you with his feare, 
 
Shrewsbury Grammar School. 121 
 
 gouerne you with liis grace, and make you a good 
 seruant to your Prince and Countrey. 
 
 " Your louing Father, Henry Sidney." 
 
 To this there is appended a postscript from the 
 pen of his mother, Lady Sidney, as follows : 
 
 " Your 'Nohle and carefull Father hath taken paynes 
 with his owne hand, to giue you in this his letter, so 
 wise, so learned, and most requisite precepts for you 
 to follow, with a diligent and humble thankefull 
 minde, as I will not withdrawe your eies from be- 
 holding and reuerent honoiing the same: No, not 
 so long time as to read any letter from me, and there- 
 fore at this time I will write unto you no other letter 
 than this, wherby I first blesse you, with my desire to 
 God to plant in you his grace, and secondarily warne 
 you to haue alwaies before the eyes of your mind, 
 these excellent counsailes of my Lord your deere 
 Father, and that you fayle not continually once in 
 foil re or five dales to reade them ouer. And for a 
 finall leave taking for this time, see that you she we 
 your selfe as a louing obedient Scholer to your good 
 Maister, to gouerne you yet many yeeres, and that 
 my Lord and I may heare that you profite so in your 
 
122 School-Boy Life in Meriiie England. 
 
 learning, as thereby you may encrease our louing care 
 of you, and deserue at his haiides the continuance of 
 his great ioy, to have him often witnesse with his own 
 hande the hope he hath in your well doing. Farewell 
 my little Pliillip^ and once againe the Lord blesse 
 you 
 
 Makie Sidney." 
 
 " Your louing Mother, 
 
CHRIST HOSPITAL 
 
Christ Hospital, 
 
 (THE B L U E-C OAT SCHOOL.) 
 
 ^ITAT a queer name ! is the excla- 
 mation of the reader. Yes, it 
 is a queer name. " Christ 
 J) Hospital" is the proper title, 
 but few know it as such. The 
 Blue-coat School it has been for many 
 generations ; its scholars are dubbed " Blue- 
 coat boys," and take pride in their odd 
 js^ name. Let us explain the origin of such 
 a strange title for an institution of learning. 
 
 "Blue coat" has reference to the outer tunic which 
 the scholars now wear, although its color was for- 
 merly russet. It is now, and has been for many decades, 
 of a darkish blue cloth — not quite so dark as the so- 
 called blue flannel we use in this country — and it is 
 
 *Leigli Hunt says the name is as printed here: " Christ Hospital," 
 not " Christ's." 
 
126 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 fastened down the front from collar to waist with 
 tiny round silver-plated buttons. 
 
 This coat reaches from neck to heel ; it is confined 
 at the waist by a narrow red leather strap with 
 buckle and clasp, and from the belt downward it is 
 open in front. This coat is not unlike an ulster in 
 shape, yet it is much more graceful. 
 
 Underneath the coat are a vest and knee-breeches 
 of the same material, and white under-linen. Stock- 
 ings of the brightest canary yellow tint and low 
 quarter shoes with steel buckles are worn. A plain 
 collar ending in two short bands, like those some- 
 times worn by clergymen, and a blue worsted cap 
 complete the costume, but the latter is seldom worn, 
 and the boys go bare-headed in all weathers. 
 
 Years ago the " Blues " wore a canary-colored 
 petticoat instead of the knee-breeches, and each boy 
 was compelled to carry in his hand a little cap, too 
 small for wear, and designed solely for ornament. 
 
 From this description my readers will be prepared 
 to believe that a Blue-coat boy is a rather odd-looking 
 object to transatlantic eyes ; yet I am bound to con- 
 fess that the entire dress is one that commends itself 
 on the score of comfort, healthfulness, and conven- 
 ience. 
 
Christ Hospital. 127 
 
 Thoiio^li it makes one shiver to see these bare- 
 headed lads in the London streets in the raw and in- 
 clement English winter weather, not one of them 
 seems to need sympathy. There is nothing either 
 snperliuous or lacking in the Blue-coat dress, and it 
 reminds ns irresistibly of the graceful costumes of 
 the Middle Ages — of which, in fact, it is a relic. 
 The celerity with which these boys can tuck the 
 skirts of the coat into the girdle, or "peel" when 
 taken for their weekly swim in summer, is amazinu ; 
 nor can I call to mind a funnier sight than a cricket or 
 foot-ball field dotted with these bare-headed, yellow- 
 legged youngsters. 
 
 The school is situated in Newgate Street, in the 
 heart of the "city" of London, opposite the famous 
 Newgate Prison, on the site of the ancient Friary of 
 Franciscans, where its shady play-ground, hemmed in 
 by warehouses, offices, and factories, forms a pleasant 
 oasis in the desert of stony streets by which it is 
 surrounded. Any one who has passed the gloomy 
 Newgate Jail must have noticed some ancient-look- 
 ing stone buildings on the left-hand side of Newgate 
 Street. Through a massive and ornate iron gateway 
 which guards the entrance one may often see the boys 
 at recess. These are the scholars and these are the 
 
128 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 buildings belonging to Christ Hospital, and before 
 the barred gate gray and grizzled merchants will 
 often pause in their hurried walk, the joyous shouts 
 of the careless urchins at play awaking pleasant mem- 
 ories of their own by-gone boyhood. 
 
 In the rear the property of Christ Hospital adjoins 
 that of St. Bartholomew's Hospital — another shining 
 example of munificent charity — while about a quarter 
 of a mile away stands the Charterhouse School. 
 
 The school is bounded by Newgate Street, Gilt- 
 spur Street, St. Bartholomew's, and Little Britain — 
 all ancient thoroughfares, antedating the school itself. 
 " There is a quadrangle with cloisters ; the square 
 inside the cloisters is called the Garden, and was 
 probably the monastery garden. But," says Leigh 
 Hunt, " its only delicious crop, for many years, has 
 been paving-stones." Another large area is named 
 the Ditch, the town ditch having formerly run that 
 way. A portion of the old quadrangle was once 
 repaired by the famous Whittington during one of 
 his mayorships, and for a long time bore his coat-of- 
 arms. In the cloisters lie buried a number of his- 
 toric personages, among them being Isabella, wife of 
 Edward Second, nicknamed " the she-wolf of France." 
 Leigh Hunt says Christ Hospital is a "nursery of 
 
Christ HosriTAL. 121) 
 
 tradesmen, of naval officers, of merchants, of scliol- 
 ars ; it lias produced men who were amon^ the ^reat- 
 est ornaments of their time ; and the feeling among 
 the hoys themselves is that it is a medium between 
 the patrician pretenses of such schools as Eton and 
 Westminster and the plebeian submission of the char- 
 ity schools." He says, in evidence of its democratic 
 spirit, that in his time there were two boys there, 
 '^one of whom, after school, went up into the 
 drawing-room to his father, the master of the house ; 
 while the other went down into the kitchen, to his 
 father, the coachman. The boys had no sort of feel- 
 ing of the difference of one another's ranks out of 
 doors. The cleverest boy was the noblest, let his 
 father be who he midit." 
 
 Although many of the English monasteries were 
 the scenes of much that was evil, yet they did a good 
 work in caring for the poor in their immediate neigh- 
 borhoods. The Grey Friars in Newgate Street were 
 no exception to this rule, so when King Henry Eighth 
 drove out the monks and shut up their friary many 
 of the great city's poor were left without any one to 
 whom they could turn for help in time of need. In 
 those days the misery of the poor in the great capital 
 was extreme, and, knowing this, the king gave " the 
 
130 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mkrrie England. 
 
 cliiircli and lionse of the late Grey Friars within the 
 city, and all tlie appurtenances thereto belonging " — 
 so the old parchment deed of gift runs — to the 
 mayor and corporation of London, intending tliat 
 they should put it to some charitable use. But after 
 the gift was made notliing was done, and the prop- 
 erty lay idle. But his son, the youthful Edward 
 Sixth, remembered the gift, and by him the grant 
 was revived and made of real benefit. 
 
 Edward was but ten years old when he came to tlip 
 throne, and he died when he was sixteen, yet, child 
 as he w^as, lie was not too young to care for others, 
 and it w\as peculiarly fitting that this boy ruler should 
 found a home for children who were fatherless and 
 destitute, where they might be sheltered, clothed, 
 fed, and educated. His memory is kept green to 
 this day among the "Blues;" his statue stands over 
 the entrance to the Hospital, and there are no less 
 than three oil-paintings of him in different parts of 
 the building. 
 
 Christ Hospital was founded by King Edward 
 Sixth, June 26, 1553, and was at first intended as 
 a "hospital for orphans and foundlings," the older 
 meaning of the word hospital signifying an asylum 
 or place of refuge. Charles Second added to the 
 
Christ Hospital. 131 
 
 scliool in 1672, and at various times since it has been 
 enlarged, rebuilt, or improved. 
 
 In 1825 the Duke of York hiid the corner-stone of 
 a magnificent hall, and in 1863 an ''annex" was es- 
 tablished at Hertford for the youno^er boys. The 
 annual income, derived from rents and from money 
 in the funds, is about £75,000 (in round numbers, 
 $350,000), and there are some eight hundred boys at 
 the school in London besides four hundred at the 
 preparatory school Mt Hertford ; where there are also 
 about sixty girls, who make and sew almost all the 
 linen used by themselves and the boys. 
 
 Although the intentions of its princely founder 
 have been departed from, in respect to parentless 
 children alone being admitted, and although the in- 
 stitution is now a great deal more than a mere charity 
 affair, yet the school, we are told, " has never ceased 
 to preserve its reputation as one of the first charitable 
 institutions of England, where the sons of gentlemen 
 and professional men of small income may receive 
 free living, free education, and free clothing." 
 
 The noble school was originally so richly endowed 
 and has so flourished during the last three hundred 
 years that it is to-day one of the wealthiest institu- 
 tions connected with Britain's metropolis. There is 
 
132 School- DoY Life in Merkie England. 
 
 a story to the eEect that the pioos young Edward 
 was prompted to endow the three sister "hospitals," 
 of St. Thomas, the Bridewell, and Christ, by a sermon 
 on " Charity " preached before him at Westminster 
 by Bishop Kidley. Stow, the quaint chronicler of 
 the time, relates a characteristic anecdote of the 
 generous prince. A blank having been left in the 
 deed for the sum which the young king should be 
 pleased to grant, "he, looking on the void place, 
 called for pen and ink, and w^th his own hand wrote 
 four thousand metrics hy the year ; and then said : 
 ' Lord, I yield thee most hearty thanks that thou hast 
 given me life thus long to finish this work to tlie 
 glory of thy name ! ' " 
 
 Prominent among the great men who have been 
 educated at Christ Hospital stand Richardson, the 
 novelist; Edward Stillingfleet, chaplain to Charles 
 Second and an eminent English prelate ; William Cam- 
 den, the antiquary ; Samuel Taylor Coleridge ; Bishop 
 Thomas Fanshawe Middleton, of Calcutta; James 
 Scholefield, the eminent Greek scholar; Joshua 
 Barnes, the learned divine ; Thomas Barnes, for some 
 years editor of The Times of London ; the Rev. 
 George Townsend, a scholar of vast attainments ; 
 Charles Lamb ; Thomas Hartwell Home, and Leigh 
 
Chkist Hospital. 133 
 
 Hunt, wliom our Hawthorne called a " stray Amer- 
 ican," besides a host of lesser lights. Leigh Hunt 
 says that Christ Hospital "toward the close of the 
 last century and the beginning of the present sent 
 out more living writers in its proportion than any 
 other school." 
 
 Admission to the school can only be secured by 
 means of a " presentation " by one of the governors, 
 and upon certain conditions. Each " governor," by 
 virtue of a donation of £500 ($2,500) is entitled to 
 pi-esent one boy every three years. Candidates must 
 be between eight and ten years of age, and free from 
 any active disease or physical defect. It is assumed 
 that their parents, if one or both be living, are of in- 
 sufficient means to properly educate and maintain 
 them, and that the children have not such means of 
 their own, either present or prospective. A written 
 statement, answering questions bearing on these 
 topics, must be handed in, showing the amount of 
 the parental income, the number of children in the 
 family, how many of these are of tender age, and so 
 on. 
 
 This statement must be indorsed by the governor 
 presenting the boy, registering his belief that the 
 child so presented is a proper subject for admission 
 
ISi School-Boy Life in Meerie England. 
 
 into the school. No scholar can remain after the age 
 of fifteen, except king's scholars, who attend the 
 mathematical school founded by Charles Second in 
 10 72, and " Grecians," the members of the highest 
 class. 
 
 The government of the school is vested in the 
 "General Court of Governors," consisting of upward 
 of five hundred noblemen and gentlemen, with whom 
 alone rests the right of presentation. 
 
 The education given at Christ Hospital is of a high 
 grade, and its pupils rank with those of Charterhouse 
 or Westminster. Latin and Greek are the basis of 
 the studies, while the modern languages, the sciences, 
 drawing, music, etc., are taught. The branches of a 
 good, solid English training, of course, are not neg- 
 lected, such as grammar and the three R's. But 
 in addition to the liberal scheme of tuition, Christ 
 Hospital provides food, clothes, and shelter for its 
 scholars. Consequently, presentations are eagerly 
 sought after, and the list of candidates is always far 
 in excess of present and prospective vacancies. Fre- 
 quently, also, when at length a boy's name is reached, 
 the long delay has put him above the age of ten 
 years, and he is ineligible. The writer was one of 
 those nnfortunates. 
 
Chuist Hospital. 135 
 
 With few exceptions tlie head-nuisters have always 
 been old "Blues/' The salary attached is £1,000 a 
 year, besides wliicli a dwelling and subsistence are pro- 
 vided for himself and his family free of charge. Thus 
 the master of Christ Hospital enjoys an income far in 
 excess of that accruing to many a college president in 
 these United States. The tutors are all University 
 men, and number twenty-eight. They are paid, on 
 an average, £600 yearly. 
 
 The followino^ amusino; letters * from a real Blue- 
 coat boy give us many glimpses at the life of the 
 scholars at Christ Hospital in recent years. In the 
 first one we are to imagine the " new boy " in the 
 midst of his trials and torments : 
 
 Hertford. 
 
 Dear Mater : I don't mind going without a hat 
 at all, and I have learned how to tuck my gown into 
 my girdle when I play, but I wish I wasn't a new 
 boy. 
 
 I haven't touched my grub yet, as I don't feel very 
 well. I bought a shilling's worth of jumbles at the 
 tuck shop last night, and eat them in bed, with some 
 condensed milk and sardines another fellow gave me. 
 
 * Published by Mr. Hiigli Francis Fox iu Uarper^s Young People, 
 1886. 
 
136 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 1 luive got a bad toothache to-da}^ I think I must 
 have caught cold in my tooth on the journey. Please 
 send nie some wool to put in it. 
 
 Tlie fellows sent me down to the cook this morning 
 to have my mouth measured for a spoon. The cook 
 told me to shut my eyes and open my mouth wide, 
 and then he crammed it full of salt. Don't you 
 think that was awfully mean, mater ? 
 
 Your affec. son. 
 
 The next letter finds him on his footing with his 
 mates, and reconciled to the school and its discipline : 
 
 Hertford. 
 
 Dear Mater : I like school a great deal better 
 now. The fellows are all collecting pins. One fel- 
 low liasn't any roof to his mouth, and he is showing 
 it at a pin a peep ; so I thought I would show my 
 enlarged tonsils. I let them have three peeps for 
 two pins, and called it " The Great and Only Tonsil 
 Show — patronized by the Queen and all the Royal 
 Family." I got no end of a lot of pins ; but some of 
 the big chaps wanted to tickle my tonsils with a 
 tooth-brush, so I closed the show. Please send me 
 a whole lot of pins on my birthday. 
 
 I got in an awful row this morning. The fellow 
 
Christ Hospital. 137 
 
 next me Lad a cold in his head, and snuffled like any 
 thing all through first lesson. He hadn't any hand- 
 kerchief, so he asked me to lend him mine. I hate 
 lending other fellows my handkerchief; but I didn't 
 want to use it, so I told him I would lend it him for 
 a penny a blow. He said he didn't think less than 
 three blows would be any good, and he had only 
 tuppence witli him ; so I let him have three blows 
 for tuppence. I dropped one of the pennies on the 
 floor, and the master heard it, and made me tell all 
 about it. Then he said I was a wretched little money- 
 grubber, and w^asn't fit to sit with the other boys, and 
 told me to go outside and play with the sparrows. I 
 have lost five places by it, and think it is very hard 
 lines. Would you lend your handkerchief to another 
 fellow for nothing? 
 
 Give my love to the children. Your affec. son. 
 
 He is now able to criticise his companions — a sure 
 
 sign that he feels perfectly at ease : 
 
 Hertford. 
 
 I)eak Old Mater : Thanks awfully for the sticking- 
 plaster. The fellow w^ho sits next to me in church 
 has a game-leg. He says he was riding on the ele- 
 phant at the Zoo, and some one made faces at him, 
 and he ran away w^tli him on his back, and one of 
 
138 SciiooL'BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 the keepers tripped him up with some string, and he 
 tumbled down and threw liim onto the path, and 
 broke his leg. 
 
 There is a new boy sitting by me who has yellow 
 hair and red eyes, and blubs all the time, because he 
 is home-sick, I suppose. He has just showed me his 
 album, and his sister is as ugly as any thing. She is 
 all squint-eyed, and her face is covered with freckles. 
 He says he is going to ask nie to stay with him in 
 the summer holidays, but I don't mean to go. 
 
 I haven't any more to say, so I will say good-bye. 
 
 Your affec'ate son. 
 
 Our Blue-coat boy is now arrived at the dignity of 
 a transfer to the main school at London, and feels 
 
 full of importance in consequence: 
 
 London. 
 
 Dear Mater: Please address my letters Mr. H. F. 
 Fox, now I am a London fellow. 
 
 There are eight hundred boys in the London 
 school, and some of them are nearly twenty years 
 old, and have whiskers. We come out of morning 
 school at a quarter past twelve, and at a quarter to 
 one preparation bell rings, and we all tear olf to our 
 wards to get ready for dinner. At one o'clock the 
 bugle sounds, and we march to the hall play -ground 
 
Christ TTospital. 139 
 
 and fall in by the side of our ward flags. There are 
 sixteen companies of fifty boys each. We fall in in 
 double rank, behind the corporal and monitor, and 
 stand at ease till the bugle goes again. Then the 
 sergeant gives the word of command : 
 
 '' 'Tention. Dress by the right. Form fours right. 
 Forward — Marr-r-ch ! " 
 
 Then the band strikes up, and we march round the 
 play-ground and into the big dining-hall. When the 
 boys are all at their tables, the warden gets onto his 
 platform, and gives three raps with his hammer, and 
 we have to stop talking. We all sing a hymn, and 
 one of the Grecians gets into the pulpit, and reads 
 grace, and then the warden raps again, and we begin 
 to eat. 
 
 The sergeant is awfully brave, and has five medals. 
 He says he knew the Duke of Wellington quite well, 
 and fought beside him in the battle of Waterloo. He 
 has no end of a big chest. The brass band makes a 
 jolly row. There are fifty boys in it, and they have 
 a big drum and five kettle-drums. Your affec. son. 
 
 The boys who are at the main school in London 
 look down on the boys at Hertford, and call them 
 " cads." The next epistle, " on the choice of a pro- 
 
140 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 fession," is delicious reading because of -its boyish 
 
 artlessness : 
 
 London, 
 
 Dear Mater : We are learning " The Ladj of the 
 Lake " this term. I think poetry is jolly fun. If 
 you won't let nie be a soldier, I think I would like to 
 be a poet. Do you think Sir Walter Scott was much 
 older than 1 am when he began to be a poet ? I 
 wrote you a poem in the French school this morning, 
 because I had nothing to do. I wrote it without 
 thinking at all, and it only took me half an hour. 
 
 Don't tell any one I am writing poetry, please, 
 because they would only chaff me. 
 
 Your affec. son. 
 
 Some school customs come in for their share of 
 
 notice in the next three : 
 
 London. 
 
 Dear Mater : We had the first public supper last 
 
 night. They have them every Thursday in Lent, 
 
 and heaps of people come to see them. While we 
 
 are having supper the people walk round the hall and 
 
 watch us. The Duke of Cambridge presided last 
 
 night, and he patted me on the head as he passed me. 
 
 One of our beadles was in the Crimean war, and the 
 
 Duke went and talked to him. Tlie beadle said 
 
Christ Hospital. 141 
 
 " your lionor " every minute, and at last the Duke 
 said, " Don't call me your honor— call me 5^>." 
 
 After supper we all have to " bow round." The 
 wards form into ranks, with the matrons and mon- 
 itors in front. The boys who carry the bread basket 
 come next. Then come the rest of the boys, the 
 table-cloth, knife, and water boys coming last. We 
 walk past the President two at a time, and bow to 
 hiin, and he bows to us. He must get very tired of 
 bowing by the time it is over. 
 
 There is a jolly swimming bath in the school, and 
 I am learning to dive. I generally manage to go 
 flat on my stomach, and it hurts like any thing. 
 
 I am going to get as strong as I can this term, so 
 that I can thrash all the fellows at home next 
 holidays. Your affec'ate son. 
 
 London. 
 Dear Mater : The Chinese Ambassadors were at 
 the last public supper. They are awfully funny- 
 looking men. The fellows say that if a Chinaman 
 has his pigtail pulled, he will be disgraced forever. 
 One of the fellows dared me to pull their tails, so I 
 squeezed in by them when they were getting into 
 their carriage after supper, and gave one of their 
 
142 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mp:rrie England. 
 
 tails a jerk. The old heathen turned round and 
 jabbered at me like any thing. I couldn't under- 
 stand what he said, but it sounded as if he was 
 swearing. I tried to get away, but one of the beadles 
 collared me, and I thought I was in for no end of a row. 
 Just then, though, I heard a shout, " Fours to the 
 rescue ! " and a lot of our fellows came running up. 
 The beadle made a grab at one of them, and another 
 fellow tripped him up, and I ran under the horse's 
 nose and got away. It was too dark for him to see 
 my face, so I think it is all right. Your affec. son. 
 
 London. 
 Dear Mater : On Easter Tuesday the whole 
 school marched through the streets to the Mansion 
 House, where the Lord Mayor lives. When the 
 Lord Mayor was ready the big doors were thrown 
 open and we marched into the Venetian Parlor. The 
 Lord Mayor was sitting at a table in his swell robes, 
 and the mace-bearer and a lot of other men in uni- 
 form were standing behind him. The Lord Mayor 
 gave each of us a brand-new shilling, and a footman 
 with powder all over his head handed us two buns 
 and a glass of wine. Last year one of the fel- 
 lows said he was a teetotaler, and refused to drink 
 
Christ [Iospital. 143 
 
 his wine, and the Lord Mayor sent him a nice book 
 afterward, so I tlionglit I would refuse to take the 
 wine too. He didn't give me a book, though, and I 
 think it is a regular sell. Your affec'ate son. 
 
 These are no " made-up" letters, but were actually 
 sent by a flesh-and-blood Blue-coat boy to his 
 ^' mater." 
 
 One other quaint custom deserves to be noticed. 
 Every Good Friday sixty of the "Blues" go to the 
 ancient city church of All-Hallows, in Lombard 
 Street, where, after singing an anthem, they are pre- 
 sented with a penny and a paper bag of raisins ! In 
 the seventeenth century a worthy London " cit " 
 left a bequest of money for this purpose. But only 
 the little fellows go on this pilgrimage, and when 
 they come back they are unmercifully chaffed by the 
 older boys, w^ho chant a doggerel refrain as follows : 
 
 '• Come, little Blue-coat Boy, come, come, come, 
 Sing for a penny and chant for a plum." 
 
 Another ancient privilege gives the boys free admis- 
 sion at all times to the far-famed Tower of London. 
 
 Having now some idea of the make-up of the 
 Blue-coat School, let us glance at its inner life and 
 working. 
 
lltt School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 Tlie school in London is divided into sixteen 
 "wards" of forty-five boys each, and every "ward" 
 is presided over by a monitor, whose duty it is to 
 keep order in the dormitory and at meal-tiines. For 
 purposes of study the boys are graded into Upper 
 and Lower Grammar, with three forms eacli, tlie 
 Mathematical, and the English and Commercial, 
 which are the lowest classes, into which the little 
 fellows are put when they come up from Hertford. 
 Then there is the Modern School, having two lower 
 fourth forms and two upper fourth forms. Many 
 boys leave the school after going through the upper 
 fourth. But for those who choose to remain there 
 are still higher grades and valuable benefits, witli 
 college preparation. Those boys who remain in the 
 school after passing the upper fourth go on to otlier 
 classes, called " Little Erasmus," " Great Erasmus," 
 " Deputy Grecians," " Junior Grecians," and " Gre- 
 cians," names peculiar to the Blue-coat School. 
 
 In the Commercial School the boys get a thorough 
 drilling in mercantile affairs, so that at the age of fif- 
 teen, when the course closes, they are often received 
 into prominent city offices as junior clerks and ac- 
 countants. This is tlie largest class in the school. 
 
 The Mathematical School carries its pupils, w^ho 
 
Christ Hospital. 145 
 
 are called "King's Boys," and who are forty in 
 number, a step liiglier. This department was 
 founded by Charles Second, with the object of 
 fitting its scholars for the navy. Under his grant 
 ten boys are annually sent up to the Trinity House 
 for examination in nautical affairs. On passing 
 this ordeal they are detailed to the naval service, 
 choosing for themselves the department they like 
 best — engineering, gunnery, or navigation. Before 
 leaving the school each boy is presented with a set 
 of nautical instruments — quadrant, chronometer, sex- 
 tant, etc. — a well-filled sea chest, a silver watch, and 
 £15 in money. When he has completed three years 
 of sea service the youth may, if he so choose, and 
 can prove that he is proficient in his profession, 
 return to the school, and claim a further grant of 
 £15. These "Koyal Mathematical Boys" wear a 
 medal on their shoulders as a distinguishing badge, 
 and once a year they go to court, where their maps 
 and charts are examined by the queen in person ; a 
 custom that has come down to us from the founding 
 of the school. 
 
 The members of the highest classes in the upper 
 school are termed " Grecians " — it is supposed be- 
 cause in the early annals of the institution they were 
 10 ^ 
 
143 ScHooL-EoY Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 tlie only scholars taiiglit Greek. They are twentj- 
 four in number, and are divided into " five Exhibi- 
 tioners, eight Second Grecians, and twelve Proba- 
 tionary Grecians." Four of this class are annually 
 sent to tlie Universities of Oxford or Canibrido:e at 
 the expense of Christ HospitaL The yearly value 
 of these "exhibitions" or scholarships is £100 
 apiece. " Upon proceeding to either university each 
 Grecian receives an allowance of £20 for books, £10 
 for clothes, and £30 for fees, etc. Thus, a youth 
 who sticks to the school, and pursues his studies 
 successfully, is in a great measure provided for all 
 through his life. A boy is fed, clothed, and taught 
 fron"! the age of eight or nine to eighteen ; lie is 
 sent to a university with a yearly allowance ample 
 for a young man to subsist on ; all the university 
 honors are open to him, and should he succeed in 
 winning a college fellowship a living is secured to 
 him for life, provided he does not marry ; he may 
 compete at the o])en examinations for the scientific 
 service of the army or for appointment in the home 
 or colonial civil service." Think what a boon these 
 advantages are to many. 
 
 A Grecian has several privileges. He may sit up 
 till eleven o'clock; he has a special fag to wait on 
 
Chkist Hospital. 147 
 
 him ; he may visit his friends at any time out of 
 school hours ; he has such delicacies as fish or bacon 
 for breakfast, and jam for tea ; he eats by himself, 
 at a separate table, and has a private room to study 
 in. The other boys dub them '' swells." 
 
 Formerly the discipline was very severe, and the 
 routine of studies pursued was neither very enlight- 
 ened nor conducive to rapid advancement in learn- 
 ing. But of late years many needed changes and 
 improved methods have been introduced. 
 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge has left us some amusing 
 records of his life there. Floggings were numerous 
 in those days, and the head-master's wife was held 
 in fond remembrance by him and his school-mates 
 because she frequently invoked the sparing of the 
 rod. On one occasion Mr. Boyer was lecturing 
 Coleridge and another boy before administering a 
 whipping. Suddenly Mrs. Boyer looked into the 
 room. 
 
 " Mind you flog them soundly," she called out. 
 
 " Away ! madam, away ! " laughingly retorted her 
 husband, who knew she meant otherwise, and the 
 culprits escaped. 
 
 This Mrs. Boyer was "a sprightly, good-looking 
 woman with black eyes, and was belield witli trans- 
 
148 SciiooL-BoY Life in Meekie England. 
 
 port by the boys whenever she appeared at the 
 school door. Her husband's name, uttered in a tone 
 of mingled good nature and imperativeness, brought 
 him down from his seat w^ith smiling haste. Some 
 of us were not liked the better by the master be- 
 cause we were in favor with his wife. On entering 
 the school one day he found a boy eating cherries. 
 * Where did you get those cherries ? ' he thundered, 
 tliinking the boy had no excuse. ' Mrs. Boyer gave 
 them me, sir.' He turned away, scowling w^ith dis- 
 appointment." 
 
 This Head-master Boyer would seem to have been 
 not a very lovable man. Though he was a good 
 pedagogue, he was irritable, unfair, and a toady, and 
 was given to severe punishments. Coleridge said 
 of him, when he heard of liis death : " It is lucky 
 that the cherubim wdio took him to heaven wore 
 nothing but faces and wings, or he w^ould certainly 
 liave flogged them by tlie way." Boyer could not 
 understand a lad of Coleridge's temperament, and 
 jeeringly referred to him as "that sensible fool 
 Coleridge." There are several choice anecdotes ex- 
 tant about Boyer and his boys, and we may here cite 
 a few of them. 
 
 " One anecdote of his injustice will suffice for all. 
 
Christ Hospital. 149 
 
 It is of ludicrous enormity; nor do I believe any 
 thing more flagrantly willful was ever done by him- 
 self. I heard Mr. C , the sufferer, now a most 
 
 respectable person in a government ofiice, relate it 
 with a due relish, long after quitting the school. 
 
 The master was in the habit of ^spiting' C ; 
 
 that is to say, of taking every opportunity to be se- 
 vere with him ; nobody knew why. One day he 
 comes into the school, and finds him placed in the 
 middle of it with three other boys. He was not in 
 one of his w^orst humors, and did not seem inclined 
 vO punish them till he saw his antagonist. ' O, 
 O, sir ! ' said he ; ^ what, you are among them, are 
 you ? ' and gave him an exclusive thump on the 
 face. He then turned to one of the Grecians, and^ 
 said, ' I have not time to flog all these boys : make 
 them draw lots, and I'll punish one.' The lots were 
 drawn, and C 's was favorable. ' O, O ! ' re- 
 turned the master, when he saw them, 'you have 
 escaped, have you, sir ? ' and pulling out his watch, 
 and turning again to the Grecian, observed that he 
 found he had time to punish the w^hole three ; ^ and, 
 
 sir,' added he to C , with another slap, ' I'll 
 
 begin with you^ He then took the boy into the 
 library and flogged him ; and, on issuing forth again, 
 
150 School-Boy Life in Mp:RrtiE England. 
 
 had the face to say, with an air of indifference, ' I 
 have not time, after all, to punish these two other 
 boys ; let them take care how they provoke me an- 
 other time.* " 
 
 There was a book used by the learners in reading 
 entitled. Dialogues Between' a Missionary and an 
 Indian. One lad used to read with a deep toned 
 drawl and a total omission of punctuation marks. 
 Thus would the master and pupil proceed : 
 
 Master. — " Kow, young man, have a care, or I'll 
 set you a swinging task." [A favoi'ite phrase of his.] 
 
 Pupil.— [Making a sort of heavy bolt at his calam- 
 ity, and never remembering his periods and commas.] 
 " Missionary Can you see the wind ? " 
 
 [Master gives him a slap on the cheek.] 
 
 Pupil. — [Raising his voice to a cry, and still for- 
 getting the period.] " Indian No ! " 
 
 Master. — " Gad's-my-life, young man ! Have a 
 care how you provoke me." 
 
 Pupil. — [Always forgetting the stop] " Missionary 
 How then do you know that there is such a thing ? " 
 
 [Here a terrible thump.] 
 
 Pupil. — [With a shout of agony.] " Indian Because 
 I feel it." 
 
 " Sometimes," says Leigh Hunt, " our despot got 
 
Cueist Hospital. 151 
 
 into a dileinina, and then he did not know how to get 
 out of it. A boy, now and then, would be roused 
 into open and fierce remonstrance. I recollect S., 
 afterward one of the mildest of preachers, starting up 
 in his place and pouring forth on his astonished 
 hearer a torrent of invectives and threats, which tlie 
 other could only answer by turning pale and uttering 
 a few threats in return. Nothing came of it. He 
 did not like such matters to go before the governors. 
 Another time Favell, a Grecian, a youth of high 
 spirit, whom he had struck, w^ent to the school door, 
 opened it, and turning round with the handle in his 
 grasp, told him he would never set foot again in the 
 place unless he promised to treat him with more deli- 
 cacy. ^ Come back, child ; come back ! ' said the 
 other, pale, and in a faint voice. There was a dead 
 silence. Favell came back, and nothing more was 
 done." 
 
 There was a lad named Le Grice, the pet of the 
 school, a Deputy Grecian at the time of which we 
 write, and yet he was guilty of the maddest pranks. 
 Yet his mates adored him, chiefly because of his cool 
 defiance of the tyrant Boyer. " He had a fair, hand- 
 some face, with delicate aquiline nose and twinkling 
 eyes. I remember his astonishing me, when I was a 
 
152 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 ' new boy,' with sending me for a bottle of wiiter, 
 Avliicli he proceeded to pour down the back of G., a 
 grave Deputy Grecian. On the master asking one 
 day why he, of all the boys, had given up no exercise 
 (it was a particular exercise that they w^ere bound to 
 do in the course of a long set of holidays), he said he 
 had had ' a lethargy.' The extreme impudence of 
 this puzzled the master, and I believe nothing came 
 of it. But what I alluded to about the fruit was this. 
 Le Grice was in the habit of eating apples in school- 
 time, for which he had been often rebuked. One 
 day, having particularly pleased the master, the lat- 
 ter, who was eating apples himself, and who would 
 now and then with great ostentation present a boy 
 with some half-penny token of his mansuetude, called 
 out to his favorite of the moment : ' Le Grice, here 
 is an apple for you.' Le Grice, who felt his dignity 
 hurt as a Grecian, but was more pleased at having 
 this opportunity of mortifying his reprover, replied 
 with an exquisite tranquillity of assurance, ' Sir, I 
 never eat apples.' For this, among other things, the 
 boys adored him." * 
 
 On another occasion, when Coleridge was crying 
 after coming back from the holidays, " Boys," said the 
 
 * Leip;h Hunt. 
 
Christ Hospital. 153 
 
 muster, '^ the school is your fatlier ! The school is 
 your mother ! The school is your brother and your 
 sister ! The school is your second cousin and all the 
 rest of your relations ! So let us have no more 
 crying ! " 
 
 There are, of course, some queer usages connected 
 with the school, and, though they are unwritten laws, 
 they have all the force of the famous edicts of the 
 Medes and Persians. On Easter Tuesday the boys 
 walk in procession to the Mansion House, hard by, to 
 visit the Lord Mayor of London, according to a very 
 ancient custom. The Mansion House may be de- 
 scribed as the City Hall of the " city " of London. 
 There the mayor resides, and there civil and criminal 
 trials take place and all the municipal " functions" are 
 held. The boys are received in the Venetian Parlor. 
 Their visit is for the purpose of receiving a small 
 present of money. Thus, on the last occasion, 684 
 boys received a shilling, thirteen monitors received a 
 guinea, seven deputy-monitors a half -guinea, and forty- 
 one Grecians half-a-crown apiece. All the coins are 
 lew and bright, just out of the Mint. Each boy also 
 gets two buns and a glass of wine ! 
 
 Visitors are admitted to see the boys at dinner on 
 Sundays at 1:45 in the afternoon. " Public Suppers " 
 
15tl: SciiooL-BoY Life in Meerie England. 
 
 occyr on Tliursdays in Lent, except the last, and 
 crowds of visitors look in on the boys at these times. 
 Supper is succeeded by the " bow round." The 
 various " wards •' form in files and march past the 
 president and governors in couples, each bowing to 
 the other. In this odd procession the matrons and 
 monitors go first, and the rear guard is composed of the 
 bread, table-cloth, knife, and water boys. There is a 
 brass band composed wholly of the boys, also a fife- 
 an d-d rum corps. 
 
 Now let us see how the boys live. The dormitories 
 are lengthy, clean, and w^ell-ventilated apartments, 
 each holding fifty beds. Every boy has a cot to him- 
 self, and at its foot is a trunk with a hinged lid, 
 wdiich serves at once for a seat and for a wardrobe for 
 his clothes. The boys make their own beds and clean 
 their owm shoes. The lavatory is open at all hours, 
 and personal cleanliness is insisted on. In the sum- 
 mer months the school rents a large swdmming-bath 
 called the " Peerless Pool," at Iloxton, a few minutes' 
 walk distant, where they go in batches once a w-eek 
 to swim. Although fagging, as it is practiced in 
 other English schools, is unknown at Christ Hospital, 
 yet something very like it exists, for every monitor 
 has a boy to wait on him ; this boy in turn has a sec- 
 
Christ Hospital. 155 
 
 ond boy to perform tlie same service ; and the second 
 boy lias likewise a third. 
 
 All meals are taken in the great dining-hall, which 
 is a noble chamber, eighty-seven feet long, fifty feet 
 wide, and forty-six feet high. At the east end there 
 is a beautiful carved screen, on which appears the 
 legend : " Fear God, love the brotherhood, honor the 
 king." The windows of this hall are of stained glass ; 
 there is a magnificent organ in the gallery, and a num- 
 ber of paintings by such masters as Holbein, Yerrio, 
 and Lely are around the walls. 
 
 The tables are eighteen in number, of oak, placed 
 at equal distances from each other, the Grecians be- 
 ing seated by themselves on a raised dais at the upper 
 end of the room. The entire school marches in in 
 military order to the strains of the school band. When 
 every boy is opposite his plate the w^arden raps thrice, 
 which is the signal for silence. Before every meal a 
 portion of Scripture is read, a hymn sung, and grace 
 is said by one of the Grecians from a desk in the 
 center of the chamber. Then the warden raps on 
 his desk once, and the eight hundred boys fall to 
 eating. 
 
 The food furnished is plain, wholesome, and plen- 
 tiful, and consists of bread and milk for breakfast ; 
 
156 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 meats, vegetables, and fruits for dinner ; and bread 
 and butter and tea for supper. 
 
 The boys rise at six in summer and an hour later 
 in winter, and play for an hour before breakfast. 
 Then comes school from nine until noon, and again 
 from two o'clock until five. The hours between are 
 devoted to dinner and to recreation. The youngsters 
 go to bed at nine, but the seniors are permitted to 
 prepare lessons for the next day until ten o'clock, 
 when all lights nmst be put out. 
 
 There is a splendid library, numbering nearly six 
 thousand volumes, a large part of which consists of 
 works calculated to interest the younger boys. It is 
 free to all, and is open every day at stated hours. 
 
 The phiy-ground, though not suitable for cricket, 
 being graveled and paved, is of generous dimen- 
 sions. Foot-ball, chevy, and hockey, beloved by 
 English boys, are much indulged in. There is an ex- 
 cellent gymnasium attached to the school, where the 
 boys, great and small, are instructed by one of the best 
 professors in England. The governors have rented a 
 large field at Heme Hill, a few miles from the city, 
 where the boys go in detachments twice a week by 
 train to play cricket. 
 
 Frequent intercourse with friends is allowed. The 
 
Christ Hospital. 157 
 
 liolidays consist of live weeks at midsummer and 
 four weeks at Christmas. The first Wednesday of 
 each month is also appointed a " leave day," on which 
 the boys are permitted to go out to see their friends or 
 to receive them at the school. 
 
 Concerning the general character of the institution, 
 Leigh Hunt says : " Perhaps there is not a founda- 
 tion in the country so truly English, taking that word 
 to mean what Englishmen wish it to mean — some- 
 thing solid, unpretending, and free to all. More 
 boys are to be found in it who issue from a greater 
 variety of ranks than in any other school in the king- 
 dom ; and as it is the largest so it is the most various 
 of the free schools. 'Now and then a boy of patrician 
 family may be met with, but he is looked on as an 
 interloper, and against the charter. The sons of poor 
 gentry and solid London citizens abound, and with 
 them an equal share is given to the sons of trades- 
 men of the very humblest description." 
 
 The writer last quoted^ has left us in his Autobiog- 
 raphy some amusing records of the life at the Blue- 
 coat School in his time. 
 
 The w^ards, or sleeping rooms, were twelve, and 
 contained rows of beds on each side, partitioned off, 
 
 * Leio-li Hunt. 
 
158 School-Boy Lifp: in Mereie England. 
 
 but connected witli each other, and each having two 
 bojs to sleep in it. Down the middle ran the bins 
 for holding bread and other things, and serving for a 
 table when the meal was not taken in the halL To 
 each of these wards a nurse w^as (and is still) assigned, 
 who was usually the w^idow of some decent member 
 of a city guild. " Our dress w^as of the coarsest and 
 quaintest kind, but w^as respected out of doors, and is 
 so still. I believe it w^as the ordinary dress of 
 children in humble life during the reign of the 
 Tudors. We used to flatter ourselves that it was 
 taken from the monks ; and there w^ent a monstrous 
 tradition that at one period it consisted of blue velvet 
 and silver buttons ! It was said also that during the 
 blissful era of the blue velvet we had roast mutton 
 for supper. 
 
 " To say the truth, we were not too well fed at 
 that time, either in quantity or quality. Our break- 
 fast was bread and water, for the beer was too bad to 
 drink. The bread consisted of the half of a three 
 penny loaf, according to the prices then current. 
 This was not much for growing boys, who had 
 had nothing to eat from six or seven o'clock the 
 preceding evening. For dinner we had the same 
 quantity of bread, with meat only every other day, 
 
Cueist IJospital. 159 
 
 and tliat consisting of a suial] slice, sncli as would be 
 given to an infant three or four years old. Yet even 
 that, with all our hunger, we frequently left half- 
 eaten, the meat was so tough. On the other days we 
 had a milk-porridge, ludicrously thin ; or rice-milk, 
 which was better. There were no vegetables or 
 puddings. Once a month we had roast beef, and 
 twice a year a dinner of pork. One was roast, 
 the other boiled, and on the latter occasion we had 
 our only pudding, which was of pease. For supper 
 we had a like piece of bread, with butter or cheese, 
 and then to bed, ' with what appetite we might.' " 
 Of course, these sordid times have long since given 
 place to something more generous. 
 
 In Leigh Hunt's day the routine was about as fol- 
 lows : The boys rose at the call of a bell at six in 
 summer and seven in winter, and after washing and 
 dressing went at the call of another bell to breakfast. 
 All this took up about an hour. From breakfast 
 they proceeded to school until eleven, when followed 
 an hour's play. Dinner took place at twelve, and 
 tliere was a brief playtime till one, when school was 
 again in session till five in summer and four in winter. 
 At six came supper, and in summer play-time till 
 eight. But in winter bed-time followed immediately 
 
160 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 on the lieels of the evening meal. On Sundays the 
 school-time of the otlier days was spent in churcli 
 both morning and evening ; and, says Hunt, " As the 
 Bible was read to us every day before every meal, 
 and on going to bed, besides prayers and graces, we 
 rivaled the old monks in the religious part of our 
 duties." The reader may imagine a large church, 
 (Christ Church, Newgate Street), with six hundred 
 boys seated up in the air on each side of the organ, 
 the minister and a few maid-servants tilling the valley 
 beneath. " We did not dare to go to sleep. We were 
 not allowed to read. The great boys used to get 
 those who sat behind them to play with their hair. 
 Some whispered to their neighbors, and the others 
 thought of their lessons and tops. I can safely say 
 that many of us would have been good listeners, and 
 most of us attentive ones, if the clergyman could 
 have been heard. As it was, I talked as well as the 
 rest, or thought of my exercises. Sometimes we 
 could not help joking and laughing over our weari- 
 ness, and then the fear was lest the steward had seen 
 us. It was part of the business of the steward to pre- 
 side over the boys in church-time. He sat aloof, in a 
 place where he could view the whole of his flock. 
 There was a ludicrous kind of revenue we had of him 
 
Christ Hospital. IGl 
 
 wlienever a particular part of the Bible was read. 
 This was the parable of the Unjust Steward. The 
 boys waited anxiously till the passage was com- 
 menced ; and then, as if by a general conspiracy, at 
 the words 'thou unjust steward' the whole school 
 turned their eyes upon this unfortunate officer. We 
 were persuaded that the more unconscious he looked 
 the more he was acting." 
 
 "When Leigh Hunt entered the school he was 
 shown three gigantic boys — young men, rather, for 
 the eldest was between seventeen and eighteen — who, 
 he was told, were going to the University. These 
 were the Grecians of his day — the three head boys of 
 the Grammar School. The next class to these w^as the 
 Deputy Grecians. These two classes and the head 
 boys of the Navigation School held a certain rank 
 over the whole place, both in school and out. In- 
 deed, the whole of the Navigation School, upon the 
 strength of cultivating their valor for the navy and 
 being called King's Boys, had succeeded in establish- 
 ing an extraordinary pretension to respect. This 
 they sustained in a manner as laughable as it was 
 grave in its reception. It was an etiquette among 
 them never to move out of a right line as they 
 
 walked, whoever stood in their way. If aware of 
 11 
 
1G2 School-Boy Life in Mekkie EnglxVnd. 
 
 their coming the smaller boys got out of their way ; 
 if not, down they went, one or more, away rolled 
 the toy or the marbles, and on walked the future 
 captain ! 
 
 Of course, such things do not exist nowadays. 
 Christ Hospital is changed for the better, as the times 
 have changed. If it is not so aristocratic and exclu- 
 sive a foundation as Eton or Harrow, it yet has a 
 sturdy democracy and independence all its own, and, 
 all things considered, Leigh Hunt's eulogium is prob- 
 ably pretty near the truth: " Perhaps there is not a 
 foundation in the country so truly English, taking 
 that word to mean what Englishmen wish it to mean 
 — something solid, unpretending, of good character, 
 and free to all." 
 
WESTMINSTER SCHOOL. 
 
 ''IN PATRIAM POPULUMQUE." 
 
Westminster School 
 
 (ST. PETER'S COLLEGE.) 
 
 IN" Dean's Yard, Westminster, 
 under the shadow of the noble 
 abbey where shmiber some of 
 England's noblest sons, stands 
 St. Peter's College, better known 
 as Westminster School. 
 
 It is a royal foundation of great an- 
 tiquity. There was probably a school or 
 seminary here from the founding of the 
 abbey, and until the middle of the sixteenth century 
 St. Peter's College was its name. But after the 
 Eeformation, in 1560, it was re-founded and reor- 
 ganized by Queen Elizabeth as Westminster School, 
 though, as Mr. Staunton well says, the royal founda- 
 tion was no more the origin of the school than the 
 Eeformation was the origin of the Church of En- 
 gland. Ingulphus, who was private secretary to 
 
166 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 William the Conqueror, says that there was a boys' 
 school at Westminster which he himself had at- 
 tended ; and the old chronicler Stow records that 
 at Smithfield there was an annual examination or 
 competition in grammar, at which the scholars of 
 St. Peter's would hold the lists against all comers. 
 
 When Henry Eighth drove the monks out of West- 
 minster provision was made for a school in the plan 
 for the new establishment. During the reign of 
 Mary the whole school was neglected, but when 
 stanch Protestant Queen Bess ascended the throne 
 the scheme was revived as her father liad laid it 
 down, and by Henry's statutes the institution has 
 ever since been governed. James First, in the liftli 
 year of his reign, confirmed the acts of his prede- 
 cessor. During the Cromwellian rule the church 
 and school at Westminster were suppressed for a 
 time, but in 1649 Parliament passed an act for the 
 regulation of the school, and at the Restoration the 
 learned and amiable Dr. John Earle became Dean of 
 Westminster, and under his fostering care the school 
 greatly prospered. Since his day no changes of im- 
 portance have occurred. 
 
 The school buildings stand in Little Dean's Yard, 
 and consist of the school itself, the Library, the Col- 
 
Westminster School. 167 
 
 lege Dormitory, the College Hall, and several board- 
 ing-houses for the commoners. The noble gateway 
 is attributed to Inigo Jones. The school is of great 
 antiquitj^ it having been originally the dormitory of 
 the monks of St. Peter. The roof is formed of 
 massive beams of chestnut, and at the upper end is a 
 recess or apse which once doubtless contained an altar. 
 This apse is termed, in school parlance, the "Shell," 
 which is the name given to the Fifth Form, whose 
 seats are there (the same name is found at Harrow and 
 Charterhouse). Around this room are the scholars' 
 benches, and every-where on the w^ainscoted walls are 
 the carven names of former scholars, as many as six 
 generations of one family, sons following fathers, 
 being visible. Tlie feeling of love for alma iiiater^ 
 so noticeable among English Public School boys, is 
 more intense among Westminsters than any others, 
 and to them there is no chamber in the wide world 
 that possesses half the interest of the old school-room. 
 " The Upper and Lower Schools," says Mr. Staun- 
 ton, "were originally divided by a bar from which 
 a curtain was suspended. In connection with this 
 curtain a remarkable story will be found in No. 313 
 of the Sjpectator. It is told of a boy who was saved 
 by a school-fellow when at Westminster from a cruel 
 
108 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merkie England. 
 
 flogging at the hands of Dr. Busby for having torn 
 asunder the curtain in question. The boy who to 
 spare his companion received the punishment is 
 known to have been William Wake, the father of 
 Archbishop Wake. He took part in the Civil Wars 
 on the Royal side, and suffered severely. At length, 
 becoming implicated in Penruddock's rising, he was 
 seized, and tried for his life at Exeter. It happened 
 that the very school-fellow for whom many years 
 previously he had undergone the flogging was the 
 judge on that Western Circuit. The trial of the 
 rebels, as they were then called, was very short, but 
 when about to pass sentence upon them the judge, 
 liearing the name of his old friend, looked at Wake 
 attentively and asked him if he were not formerly 
 a Westminster scholar. Being convinced by the an- 
 swer that the unfortunate prisoner before him was 
 no other than the noble fellow who had taken his 
 fault and punishment upon him at school, he deter- 
 mined, if possible, to rescue Wake from death. Ac- 
 cordingly, when the trial was over, without saying a 
 word to any one, the grateful Judge started off at 
 once to London, and, by his influence with Cromwell, 
 succeeded in saving the life of his early friend. We 
 may add that the curtain has long since disappeared, 
 
Westminster School. 169 
 
 though a singular custom is still kept up at the spot 
 where the Upper and Lower Schools are separated. 
 On Shrove Tuesday the College cook, preceded by a 
 verger, comes into morning school and tosses a pan- 
 cake over the bar into the Upper School." 
 
 This queer custom, known as " Tossing the Pan- 
 cake," is not the least curious of the many odd ob- 
 servances which have fastened themselves on the 
 public school life of England. Precisely at noon 
 the whole school assembles in the great school hall, 
 and the head cook, clad in snowy linen apron, 
 sleeves, and cap, proceeds to fry a huge pancake. 
 When one side is done he grips the big frying-pan 
 in both hands, and deftly turns the other side by 
 tossing it in the air. This is termed the "little 
 toss," and is watched with deep anxiety by all the 
 scholars present. When it is successfully performed 
 (as it generally is), a deeply breathed "Ah!" 
 springs from ^ve hundred throats, and the browning 
 process goes on. At length the fateful moment ar- 
 rives, the pancake is done, and the cook mounts to 
 the master's dais, and with a mighty effort tosses 
 the huge cake high in air over the bar into tlie 
 midst of the crowd of waiting urchins. J^ot a 
 morsel ever touches the ground, for a hundred 
 
170 School-Boy Life in Meerie England. 
 
 hands are ready to seize it, and tliose lucky ones 
 who manage to catch a piece lose no tiuie in de- 
 vouring it, smoking hot and covered witli grime. 
 A similar custom is reported at Eton and Charter- 
 house. 
 
 The walls of the dormitory are crowded with the 
 names of old queen's scholars, and at the upper end 
 of the room on the right-hand side are a number of 
 tablets affixed to the walls bearing the names of the 
 captains of the school in gilt letters. Amongst these, 
 the names of William Murray, Charles Churchill, 
 Warren Hastings, Charles Abbot, and Charles Thomas 
 Longley, are especially noticeable. 
 
 Leaving college, and going through the dark 
 cloister, the visitor will find the gymnasium on his 
 right, situated in the early Norman crypt which 
 forms the substructure of the great school-room. 
 Turning to the left, along the western cloister, he 
 w^ill pass by the side of "Fighting Green," formerly 
 the scene of many a fierce encounter before "first 
 school," and in days of yore the peaceful resting 
 place of the humbler brethren of the monastery. 
 The passage through the old archway on the right 
 leads past the door of the deaneiy into a courtyard, 
 on the left-hand side of which is the college hall. 
 
Westminster School. 171 
 
 It is approached by a covered staircase, and was 
 originally the refectory of the abbot's house. The 
 hall was built by Abbot Litlington, in the reign of 
 Edward Third, and is probably the room where Eliza- 
 beth Woodville, the queen of Edward Fourth, was 
 received by Abbot Oseney on the occasion of Ei ch- 
 ard Third's conspiracy against his nephews. After 
 the final reconstruction of the Abbey by Queen 
 Elizabeth tlie abbot's refectory became the hall of 
 the whole collegiate estaWishment. In course of 
 time the dean and prebendaries withdrew, and the 
 hall was left to the scholars, who still use it as their 
 dining place. The "Election" dinner, which is 
 given by the governing body to the examiners and 
 a number of old Westminsters, takes place here 
 every year, when epigrams are recited by the boys 
 during dessert time. The ponderous tables of elm 
 are said to have been made out of the wreckage of 
 the Spanish Armada, and to be marked in several 
 places by the cannon-balls of the English ships, but 
 the tradition seems somewhat hazy and doubtful. 
 The inclosure in Great Dean's Yard is known by the 
 name of " Green," and here vigorous games of foot- 
 ball are played at odd times between school-hours. 
 Outside the archway and in front of the west door 
 
172 School-Boy Life in Merrii-: England. 
 
 of the Abbey stands a polished granite column 
 erected to the memory of the old Westminsters who 
 fell in the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny. 
 Field-Marshal Lord Raglan, Lieutenant-General Fred- 
 erick Markham, and General Sir William Barnard are 
 amongst the names of those thus commemorated. 
 Vincent Square, where the boys play cricket, is un- 
 fortuately more than half a mile from the school. 
 
 Facing the entrance to Great Dean's Yard stands 
 the grimy doorway, also designed by Inigo Jones, 
 and covered with the names of old Westminsters, 
 carved deeply in the stone, through which is the 
 approach to the great school-room. The room on the 
 right, above the two flights of steps, was until lately 
 known as the Library. The Sixth are no longer 
 taught here, and it is now used as the music room. 
 The cupola of the ceiling is handsomely decorated 
 in the Italian style of the seventeenth century, but 
 the room is somewhat dull and gloomy, owing to 
 the trees in College Garden, which block out the 
 light from the only window. The great school-room 
 is of magnificent proportions, being nearly 110 feet 
 long and 44 feet high. It was formerly part of the 
 monks' dormitory, and was converted to its present 
 purpose in pursuance of a Chapter order dated the 
 
Westminster School. 173 
 
 3d of December, 1591 ; the smaller and northern 
 part being devoted to the Chapter Librar3^ The 
 massive open timber roof of chestnut, which is very 
 similar to that of Westminster Hall, is said to be of 
 the thirteenth century. 
 
 On all sides of the room are the names of old 
 Westminsters painted on the wall, hacked out on 
 the benches, and even executed in nails on the floor. 
 A great number, however, of the older names on 
 the wall have unfortunately been destroyed from 
 time to time, and it is to be hoped that in future 
 more care will be taken of them, as they certainly 
 constitute one of the most interesting features of the 
 school-room. Coming down the school steps the 
 visitor will find the entrance to college on his left 
 in the corner of the racket court. The present 
 building is not much more than a hundred and sixty 
 years old, having been built from the designs of 
 Eichard Boyle, Earl of Burlington, in the third 
 decade of the eighteenth century, in the place of 
 the old monastic granary, which had at length fallen 
 into decay after being used for nearly two hundred 
 years as the scholars' dormitory. Here the forty 
 scholars, who still wear the distinctive dress of cap 
 and gown, live. 
 
174 SciiooL-BoY Life in-Mekrie England. 
 
 On the western side of the college gardens is the 
 dormitory, a structure erected during the early years 
 of the eighteenth century, but which is familiar to 
 tlie general public on account of a very old and 
 equally unique custom, founded by request of Queen 
 EHzabeth lierself, and religiously observed to this 
 day. 
 
 This time-honored custom at "Westminster is the 
 acting of one of Terence's comedies by the boys, just 
 before the Christmas holidays, for the amusement of 
 their friends, who are invited. A small contribution 
 is afterward taken up for the benefit of tlie captain 
 of tlie school, or head boy, to assist his progress 
 through the university. Oddly enough, the dor- 
 mitory is the scene of this event, the completion of 
 which was celebrated by Elkanah Settle, the bitter 
 rival of John Dryden, in a Latin poem. Both these 
 men were old Westminsters, yet, while Dry den's 
 name is still green. Settle's is chiefly remembered on 
 account of the mauling he got under the name of 
 Doeg in Absalom, and AcJiitophel, and for the sim- 
 ilar treatment which Pope accorded him in The 
 D unclad. 
 
 The performance of the Westminster play was 
 really designed to keep up the spirit of classical 
 
Westminster School. 175 
 
 education and to make the scholars familiar with the 
 Latin vernacular. At first, of course, the scenery and 
 costumes were very crude, but of late years both have 
 been greatly improved and beautified. Singularly 
 enough, it was for attending one of these Westmin- 
 ster plays that Milton was attacked by an enemy, and 
 charged with " haunting play-houses " — a charge 
 which the sturdy old Puritan vigorously repels. In 
 1817, when there was talk of abolishing the custom, 
 a remonstrance w^as addressed to the Dean and Chap- 
 ter, signed by six hundred old Westminsters, who 
 expressed it as tlieir " firm and deliberate belief, 
 founded on experience and reflection, that the abo- 
 lition of the Westminster play cannot fail to prove 
 prejudicial to the interests and prosperity of the 
 school." 
 
 Here are a few names of great men who attended 
 Westminster School in boyhood : Dryden ; l^icholas 
 Rowe ; Charles Wesley ; Richard Cumberland ; Wil- 
 liam Cowper; the poet Cowley; Edmund Burton, 
 D.D. ; Richard Busby, wdio afterward was Head- 
 master in John Dry den's time ; Dr. South ; Charles 
 Churchill, the poet ; Edward Gibbon ; Ben Jonson ; 
 White Kennet, the prelate ; John Locke, the philos- 
 opher ; and Zachary Pearce. Nine archbishops and 
 
176 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 three-score bishops are on the roll, besides as many 
 ministers equally famous. Of great lawyers educated 
 there we may name Heneage Finch, known to the 
 profession as " the Father of Equity ; " Earl Cowper, 
 twice Lord Chancellor; Robert Henley, also twice 
 Chancellor ; Sir Thomas Clarke, Master of the Rolls ; 
 the great Lord Mansfield ; Sir Francis Buller ; 
 Lord Chief Baron Macdonald, and Sir David Dun- 
 das, Solicitor-General. Of statesmen she claims 
 such names as Sir Harry Yane ; Halifax, " the 
 Trimmer ; " the Earl of Bath ; the Marquis of Lans- 
 downe ; Warren Hastings, " the great Indian Pro- 
 consul ; " and Lord John Russell. Seven field mar- 
 shals of the British army also sprang from Westmin- 
 ster; namely, Henry Paget, Marquis of Anglesea; 
 Thomas Grosvenor; John Byng; Stapleton Cotton, 
 and Lord Raglan. These are noble names, and yet 
 the list is incomplete, for among British poets and 
 authors Westminster claims, in addition to those 
 named at the head of this paragraph, Matthew Prior, 
 Rowe, John Locke, Thomas Sheridan, both the Col- 
 mans, Richard Cumberland, Home Tooke, and Rob- 
 ert Soutliey. Sir Christopher Wren, the architect, 
 whose monument is St. Paul's Cathedral, was also 
 a Westminster. 
 
Westminster School. 177 
 
 The followinoj details as to admission are essential 
 to a proper idea of the working of the school : 
 
 The foundation of Queen Elizabeth consists of 
 forty queen's scholars, who live together in the 
 college buildings. The admission to vacancies is 
 by open competition. 
 
 Competitors for queen's scholarships are called 
 minor candidates. 
 
 There are also twelve exhibitioners, who may live 
 either in a boarding house or at home. The exhi- 
 bitions are tenable for two years, or until the holder 
 is elected upon the foundation ; but deserving boys 
 may be re-elected. 
 
 Queen's scholars and exhibitioners hold their 
 scholarships and exhibitions subject to an annual 
 examination, in which any boy failing to satisfy the 
 examiner of his industry and progress forfeits, if a 
 scholar, his place on the foundation, or, if an exhi- 
 bitioner, his exhibition. 
 
 The age of admission for town boys or boys not 
 on the foundation is ordinarily from ten to four- 
 teen years. As soon as possible after deciding to 
 send their sons to the school, it is desirable that 
 parents should seek an interview with the Head- 
 master, to discuss the preparation required. An 
 12 
 
178 School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 entrance examination is held at the beginning of 
 each term. 
 
 There is a preparatory school in connection with 
 Westminster in which the course of work is arranged 
 to lead up to the under forms. 
 
 Town boys may board at one of the boarding 
 houses, wholly (boarders) or partially (half -boarders) ; 
 or entirely at home (home boarders). 
 
 Before the admission of any boy into the school a 
 certificate of good conduct and character is required 
 from his former master or tutor. This certificate is 
 in all cases to be sent to the Head-master. 
 
 'No boy is allowed to remain in the school after 
 the end of the term in which he shall be nineteen 
 years of age. 
 
 The school-hours are ordinarily from 9 A. M. to 
 12.30 P. M., with an interval of fifteen minutes, and 
 from 3.30 to 5 P. M. There is a morning prepara- 
 tion school for boarders. At 9 A. M. the school 
 meets in the Abbey for a short service. 
 
 The school holidays are four weeks at Christmas, 
 eight weeks in August and September, and three 
 weeks midway between the close of the Christmas 
 and the beginning of the summer vacation, Easter 
 being included as often as is practicable. All boarders 
 
Westminster School. 179 
 
 shall be in their houses before G P. M. of the day 
 fixed for their return, and shall bring a note, signed 
 by the parent or guardian, stating the hour at which 
 they left home. 
 
 The sports in vogue at Westminster are boating, 
 cricket, fives, racquet, football, quoits, sparring, foot- 
 races, pole-leaping, and the good old English game 
 of single-stick. From its situation, on the bank of 
 the Thames, the school has equal facilities for the 
 first-named diversion with Eton, and the two schools 
 contest constantly for the aquatic championship. 
 Fencing has lately come into vogue, and swimming 
 is taught at the baths. No scholar is allowed in the 
 boats until he is a proficient swimmer. 
 
 The system of fagging at Westminster is only 
 equaled in severity by the punishments. These latter 
 consist of heavy "impositions" of Latin or Greek 
 tasks; confinement in the school precincts, refusal of 
 " leave out," flogging with the birch, and, for extreme 
 cases, expulsion. The two latter are of rare occur- 
 rence nowada^^s. The flogging takes place in a room 
 at the back of the school, and is administered by the 
 Ilead-master in the presence of a third person, one of 
 the boys. 
 
 Here is a current story about punishment at West- 
 
180 School-Boy Life in Mereie England. 
 
 minster wliicli the bojs are never tired of repeating : 
 "A boy named by the monitor was ordered to ' stand 
 out.' He took his place clear of the desks in the 
 gangway of the school, and, with the certainty of 
 punishment hanging over him, had to wait there until 
 a file of talkers had been collected. When the row 
 of the condemned had become somewhat long, and 
 when there was a pause in the occupation of the auto- 
 crat, the chastening began. For this offense the sen- 
 tence mostly took effect on the palms of the hands, 
 and the two strings, one of culprits coming up to the 
 ordeal, the other of victims with quivering hands 
 tucked under their arms, and howling, groaning, or 
 with difficulty repressing their emotion as they wound 
 their way back to their seats, might possibly have 
 been objects replete with interest to a student of hu- 
 man nature, but were too common to excite much 
 attention among us. There w^as one little imp, as I 
 remember, who used skillfully to slip across from the 
 advancing column, hug his hands, and howl as if he 
 had been smitten, and so get back unscathed to his 
 place. It was a dangerous trick, the penalty of which, 
 if it had been detected, I dare not contemplate. I 
 know but of this one boy who tried it." 
 
 Westminster School has always been famed for its 
 
Westminster School. 181 
 
 loyalty to the monarchy of England. Richard Owen, 
 the eloquent Dean of Christ Church, and the great 
 favorite of Oliver Cromwell, declared that " it would 
 never be well with the nation till Westminster School 
 were suppressed." In 1642, when a mob of Puritans 
 attacked the Abbey, the Westminster boys aided in 
 the defense, and we read that the mob " would have 
 pulled down the organs and some ornaments of the 
 church, and for this end had forced out a pane of tlie 
 north door and got entrance ; but meeting with a 
 stout resistance from the scholars, quiremen, officers, 
 and their servants, they were driven out ; and one 
 Wiseman, a Knight of Kent, who had undertaken the 
 conduct of the mob for that day's service, was killed 
 by a tile from the battlements." 
 
 On the very day on which Charles the First was 
 executed, Robert South, the brilliant preacher and 
 wit, records that the king was publicly prayed for in 
 the school. It will be remembered that South was 
 the boy of whom Busby, with characteristic penetra- 
 tion, remarked : " I see great talents in that sulky 
 boy, and I shall endeavor to bring them out." In the 
 virtue of the rod Busby had an infallible belief, call- 
 ing it " his sieve," and saying that " whoever did not 
 pass through it was no boy for him." But though 
 
182 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 the strictest of disciplinarians Busby was both loved 
 and respected by his scholars. His monument stands 
 against the wainscot of the choir, opposite the south 
 transept, side by side with those of South and Yin- 
 cent. From this monument it is generally supposed 
 that all the numerous portraits of Busby have been 
 copied, for, according to tradition, lie is said to have 
 resolutely refused to sit to any painter in his lifetime. 
 If we are to believe Tom Brown, the likeness to the 
 original must have been most successfully caught by 
 the sculptor, as he tells us that Busby's "pupils, when 
 they come by, look as pale as his marble in remem- 
 brance of his severe exactions." Readers, too, of the 
 Spectator will remember that it was before this mon- 
 ument that Sir Koger de Coverley stood in awe and 
 exclaimed : " Dr. Busby, a great man ; whipped my 
 grandfather ; a very great man ! I should have gone 
 to him myself if I had not been a blockhead ; a very 
 great man ! " 
 
 In 1718 William Murray, the future brilliant Lord 
 Chief Justice of England, came to the school. He 
 rode, we are told, all the way from his home in Scot- 
 land, attended by an old family servant, on a Gallo- 
 way pony. A curious account of his expenses has 
 been preserved, in which, besides the payment of one 
 
Westminster School. 183 
 
 guinea " to Dr. Freind for entrance," the charge of 
 one guinea for a sword and four guineas for two wigs 
 is duly entered. In these days of general depression 
 of trade parents may at least be thankful that they 
 have no longer to provide wigs and sw^ords for their 
 sons on their entrance to a public school. While at 
 Westminster, Murray gave early proofs of his extraor- 
 dinary abilities, and in 1723 was elected to Christ 
 Church. 
 
 It is related of him that when spending a half- 
 holiday at Lady Kinnoul's house he was found com- 
 posing a Latin theme for a school exercise. On being 
 asked by his hostess what the subject was, he laugh- 
 ingly answered, " What is that to you ? " Her lady- 
 ship being greatly shocked at his apparent rudeness, 
 Murray was obliged to explain to her that he had 
 simply answered her question by giving the English 
 translation of the thesis, which was — Quid ad te 
 pertinet f 
 
 Though Cowper was by natural temperament unfit 
 to rough it with other boys, his recollection of his 
 school-days at Westminster w^ere of a pleasurable 
 character. In one of his letters he writes : " He who 
 cannot look forward with comfort must find what 
 comfort he can in looking backward. Upon this 
 
184 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 principle I, the otlier day, sent my imagination upon 
 a trip thirty years behind me. She was very obedient 
 and very swift of foot, presently performed her jour- 
 ney, and at last set me down in the sixth form at 
 Westminster. I fancied myself once more a school- 
 boy, a period of life in which, if I had never tasted 
 true happiness, I was at least equally unacquainted 
 with its contrary. . . . Accordingly, I was a school-boy 
 in high favor with the master ; received a silver groat 
 for my exercise, and had the pleasure of seeing it 
 sent from form to form for the admiration of all who 
 were able to understand it." Cowper again alludes to 
 this method of reward then prevalent at the school in 
 those lines in his Tahle Talk : 
 
 " At Westminster, where little poets strive 
 To set a distich upon six and five, 
 Where discipline helps opening buds of sense, 
 And makes his pupils proud with silver pence, 
 I was a poet too." 
 
 These customary rewards are now distributed on 
 the occasion of the yearly recitation of epigrams " up 
 school," and the Head-master still applies to the au- 
 thorities for the three pounds of Maundy money to 
 which the school is entitled every year. 
 
Merchant Taylors' School. 
 
 J^lotto : 
 
 "HOMO PLANTAT, HOMO IRRIGAT SED DEU5 
 DAT INCREMENTUM." 
 
Merchant Taylors' School, 
 
 HE trade guilds or societies of the 
 English metropolis have from 
 time immemorial played an im- 
 portant part in its history. They 
 are all of them very wealthy, and 
 every master craftsman or tradesman of 
 any note belongs to some particular guild. 
 Foremost among these societies ranks the 
 *^" Company of Merchant Taylors," on ac- 
 count of its age, its respectability, and its affluence. 
 Stow, the old chronicler of English events, says that 
 the origin of the fraternity is lost in the mist of 
 antiquity; its charter was confirmed by King Ed- 
 ward First, and it counts among its members at dif- 
 ferent times "ten English sovereigns, four foreign 
 potentates, and a number of dukes, earls, barons, 
 churchmen, and distinguished characters in various 
 walks of life." 
 
188 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 About the year 1561 this rich and honorable so- 
 ciety decided to establish in the heart of the " city " a 
 grammar school " for the better education and bring- 
 ing up of children in good manners and literature." 
 The requisite funds were soon subscribed, and a piece 
 of property called the " Manor of the Rose," situated 
 in tlie parish of St. Lawrence Poultney, which had 
 originally been the residence of several noble fam- 
 ilies. The changes needful to fit the premises to 
 their new uses were speedily made, and in 1562 the 
 school was opened with 250 scholars, the statutes 
 being almost the same as those drawn up for St. 
 Paul's School by the famous Dean Colet. 
 
 The school rapidly increased in popularity, and the 
 applications for admission soon exceeded the accom- 
 modations. Many eminent and learned men figured 
 as head-masters during the next fifty years, and the 
 prosperity of Merchant Taylors' School was as- 
 sured. In 1603, and again in 1665, it became neces- 
 sary to close its doors on account of a visitation of 
 the plague ; and in 1666 the Great Fire reduced the 
 buildings to a heap of ashes. They were rebuilt in 
 1675, the studies having been carried on meanwhile 
 in premises rented for the emergency. These new 
 buildings consisted of a long and spacious school- 
 
Merchant Taylors' School. 189 
 
 room, a library building, and the master's liouse. In 
 these surroundings the school- continued its good 
 work to our own day, until the need of a roomier 
 and more modern structure became apparent. 
 
 In July, 1866, negotiations were concluded with 
 the trustees of Charterhouse School for the sale of 
 the play-ground of that institution, and on August 
 20, 1867, an act was passed by Parliament which 
 gave powers for the sale of the school site of Char- 
 terhouse to the Merchant Taylors' Company and for 
 the removal of Merchant Taylors' School from Suf- 
 folk Lane to the ground theretofore occupied by 
 Charterhouse School. The ground thus sold was in 
 extent five acres, two roods, and the price paid for it 
 was £90,000. Thus very important advantages, says 
 William Haig Brown, were secured for both of these 
 ancient foundations. Charterhouse by its constitu- 
 tion was a school for boarders. In the confined and 
 unsuitable site on which it stood it languished and 
 declined. On that site no power could maintain the 
 long-established reputation of Charterhouse School ; 
 and it was firmly believed by almost all who knew 
 it that its revival could only be effected by a migra- 
 tion to "fresh fields and pastures new." This 
 opinion has been amply justified. Merchant Tay- 
 
190 SciiooL-BoY Life m Merkie England. 
 
 loi's' School was established as a day-school, and as 
 uuch the very features which were obnoxious to a 
 boarding-school like Charterhouse became of value 
 for those lads whose residences were in the heart of 
 the city, and whose convenience demanded a school 
 near their homes. The Merchant Taylors' Company 
 immediately proceeded to erect new buildings. 
 
 Although none but day pupils are recognized by 
 the school statutes, yet some of the masters keep 
 boarding-houses for the convenience of some of the 
 scholars ; yet these houses are in no way connected 
 with the school, nor is the system encouraged by the 
 company. 
 
 The number of scholars is limited to two hundred 
 and fifty. To be eligible for admission a boy must 
 be between the ages of nine and thirteen ; at the 
 former age he must be able to read and write fairly 
 well, have learned the rudiments of Latin, and be 
 acquainted with the main facts in Bible history and 
 with the Church Catechism. If over eleven years of 
 age when nominated he must be qualified to enter 
 the Third Form, and if thirteen he must be able to 
 pass the examination for the Upper Division Form. 
 From the time of the foundation the course of study 
 has embraced Hebrew, the classics, writing, and 
 
Merchant Taylors' School. 191 
 
 arithmetic ; mathematics was first taught in 1829 ; 
 French and Modern History in 1846 ; drawing in 
 1856; writing from dictation in 1857; and in 1868 
 a conniiercial course was introduced. 
 
 The boys of Merchant Taylors' are graded into the 
 following classes : 
 
 Head Form. Upper Division. 
 
 Sixth Form. Lower Division. 
 
 Upper Fifth Form. Third Form. 
 
 Lower Fifth Form. Second Form. 
 
 Fourth Form. First Form. 
 
 There are more than fifty scholarships averaging 
 £60 = $300 a year each as incentives to good work — 
 splendid incentives to emulation in a school of two 
 hundred and fifty boys, as Mr. Staunton justly re- 
 marks. There are also yearly prizes, ranging in 
 value from fifty guineas ($250) to three pounds ($15) 
 offered by past or present wealthy friends of the 
 school. 
 
 We have said that Merchant Taylors' is a day-school 
 purely. Consequently there is no fagging — a fact 
 that makes the foundation singular among the sister- 
 hood of schools. The monitors have no arbitrary 
 powers, their duties consisting simply of the correction 
 of the papers of the younger boys. The p)unishments 
 
192 SciiooL-BoY Life in Meerie England. 
 
 are few. ^' Flogging," which the Head-master alone 
 has the right to inflict, is exceedingly rare. The 
 under-masters employ the cane for neglect or inat- 
 tention, but grave offenses are reported to the head of 
 the school. Occasionally an offender is reprimanded 
 before all the boys, which is found to have a most 
 salutary effect. 
 
 So much for the internal economy of Merchant 
 Taylors'. Let us now glance at the sports and holi- 
 days. Owing to the fact that the great majority of 
 the boys live at home, and also to the fact that the play- 
 ground is limited in area, the calendar of sports at 
 Merchant Taylors' is not a long one. The company 
 rents a field in the outskirts for cricket and foot-ball, 
 which are really the only school games pursued. 
 School hours are from 9.15 A. M. to 1, and from 
 2 to 3.45 P. M. The holidays consist of two weeks at 
 Easter, six weeks at midsummer, and four weeks at 
 Christmas. In addition there is no school on the 
 following days : Anniversary of the death of Charles 
 First, Ash Wednesday, Ascension Day, the Queen's 
 Birthday (May 24), and Lord Mayor's Day (Nov. 9). 
 The Head-master is also empowered to grant a day's 
 holiday four times a year, and every Saturday after- 
 noon in term time is a regular holiday. Altogether 
 
Mekciiant Taylors' School. 193 
 
 the boys are in scliool about tliirty-nine weeks in the 
 year. 
 
 " The list of eminent men who were indebted to 
 Merchant Taylors' School for their early culture is a 
 proud one," says Mr. Staunton. " Of ecclesiastical 
 dignitaries of the highest rank she can boast, among 
 others, of the celebrated William Juxon, who was in 
 attendance on Charles First when he was beheaded, 
 and wlio at the Restoration w^as translated from the 
 See of London to that of Canterbury ; William Dawes 
 and John Gilbert, Archbishops of York ; and Hugh 
 Boulter, Archbishop of Armagh. 
 
 " The most conspicuous of her bishops are Lancelot 
 
 Andrewes, Bishop of Winchester, of whom it was 
 
 said, ' He possessed as many and as great virtues as 
 
 human nature could receive or industry perfect;' 
 
 Thomas Dove, Bishop of Peterborough, chaplain to 
 
 Queen Elizabeth, who, from his flowing white locks, 
 
 called him ' the Dove w^ith silver wings ; ' Matthew 
 
 Wren, Bishop of Ely ; John Buckeredge, also of 
 
 Ely, Giles Thompson, Bishop of Gloucester, and 
 
 Peter Mews, Bishop of Winchester. In law, in 
 
 letters, in medicine, and in other departments of 
 
 intelligence the school is nobly represented by such 
 
 men as Sir James Whitelocke, Justice of Common 
 13 
 
194 SciiooL-BoY Life m Mekkii': England. 
 
 Pleas and of the King's Bench ; Bulstrode White- 
 locke, his son ; Thomas Lodge ; Edmund Gajton ; 
 Sir Edwin Sandys, the traveler ; James Shirley, the 
 dramatist ; William Sherard, founder of the Oxford 
 Professorship of Botany which bears his name ; 
 Daniel Neale, who wrote The History of the Puri' 
 tans; John Byrom ; James Townley ; Eobert, iirst 
 Lord Clive ; John Latham, author of the History of 
 Birds ; Yicessimus Knox, who wrote the well-known 
 book called Knox^s Essays \ Joshua Brookes, the 
 most eminent anatomist of his time ; Charles Math- 
 ew^s, and his son, Charles James Mathews, the popular 
 comedians; Charles Young, tlie tragedian ; Sir Henry 
 Ellis, sometime Librarian to the British Museum ; 
 Henry Cline, the great surgeon ; Dixon Denham,the 
 African traveler ; John Gough Nichols, the antiquary ; 
 Sir Samuel Shepherd, Lord Chief Baron of Scotland ; 
 Sir R. B. Comyn, Lord Chief Justice of Madras; 
 Edward Bond and Samuel Birch, of the British 
 Museum ; George Robert Gray, of the Zoological 
 Department of the British Museum ; and tlie late 
 Albert Smith, the amusing exponent of An Ascent 
 of Mont Blanc, 
 
RUGBY SCHOOL 
 
 NIHIL SINE LABORANDO. 
 
Rugby School, 
 
 " Coldly, sadly, descends 
 
 The autumn evening. The field, 
 
 Strewn with its dank yellow drifts 
 
 Of withered leaves, and the elms 
 
 Fade into dimness apace, 
 
 Silent; hardly a shout 
 
 From a few boys late at their playl 
 
 The lights come out in the street, 
 
 In the school-room windows; but cold, 
 
 Solemn, unlighted, austere, 
 
 Through the gathering darkness, arise 
 
 The Chapel walls, in whose bounds 
 
 Thou, my father, art laid. 
 
 There thou dost lie, in the gloom 
 
 Of the autumn evening." 
 
 Rughy Chapel, by Matthew Arnold. 
 
 mention of Rugby instantly 
 
 brings to mind two revered 
 
 names — Tliomas Arnold, D.D., 
 
 "Arnold of Rugby," as he is 
 
 called, for fourteen years the 
 
 Head-master of the school, whose noble, 
 
 manly influence molded the lives of so 
 
 many English lads, and Thomas Hughes, 
 
 M.P., himself an old Rugbeian, the founder 
 
198 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 of New Rugby, Tennessee, and to whom English- 
 speaking boyhood every-where is indebted for that 
 inimitable portraiture of school life under the 
 Rugby roof tree, Toiti Browns School-Days, which 
 deserves to be read by every lad and placed among 
 such juvenile classics as The Pilgrim'' s Progress, 
 Robinson Crusoe, and Don Quixote. 
 
 But if it had not been for Lawrence Sheriffe, 
 says Mrs. Pennell, '* that book would probably never 
 have been written." He was not a very great or 
 famous man. He was a London grocer, one of the 
 gentlemen of Queen Bess, and, later, second warden 
 of the Grocers' Company. But before he died, and 
 just about the time when Shakespeare as a little 
 boy was toddling through Stratford streets, Lawrence 
 Sheriffe made a will in which he gave a certain 
 sum of money and part of his lands that a school 
 might be built in his native town of Rugby. It 
 was to be a free school, he said, only for the chil- 
 dren living in that part of the country, and it was 
 to be ruled by ''an honeste, discreete, and learned 
 man." And so Rugby School was founded. But 
 for a long time it was so badly managed, and the 
 number of scholars so small, that no one could 
 have imagined how great it was one day to become. 
 
KuGBY School. 199 
 
 After a while, however, matters began to improve. 
 Some of the Sheriffe property in London became 
 very valuable, and as soon as there was enongh 
 money to engage more masters more boys came 
 to be taught. But now the same thing happened 
 here that has occurred in nearly all the great public 
 schools of England. Sons of parents who were 
 rich enough to pay for their education were sent 
 to Rngby, and before long they outnumbered tlie 
 free scholars, for whom the school was really 
 founded. It was just about a hundred years ago 
 that the Eugby affairs were so much bettered. At 
 that time the boys began to come to the school 
 not only from the little village that bore the same 
 name, and from the other towns and villages of 
 Warwickshire, but from all parts of England, so 
 that when Dr. Arnold was made Head-master 
 Kugby School w^as quite a large institution. Since 
 the year 1653 the management of the school has been 
 -vested in tw^elve trustees. These were, in 1886 : 
 
 The Earl of Warwick. C. Newdigate Newdegate, Esq. 
 
 Lord Bishop of Worcester. Archdeacon Holbech. 
 
 Lord Leigh. Colonel North. 
 
 Lord Norton. Sir Frederick Peel, K. C. M. G. 
 
 The Earl of Jersey. J. Dugdalc, Esq., Q.C., M.P. 
 
 Lord Brooke. P. A. Muntz, Esq., M.P. 
 
200 School-Boy Life m Mekrie England. 
 
 Tlie town of Rugby is in Warwickshire, on the 
 river Avon — Shakespeare's Avon — about eighty 
 miles in a north-westerly direction from London, and 
 at the junction of several inij3ortant railway lines. 
 Some years ago Dickens gave humorous prominence 
 to the place in one of his Christmas stories, under 
 the title of "Mugby Junction," in which the dis- 
 comforts and oddities of the station and its crowds 
 are sketched with a master hand. But the school 
 is removed from all the bustle of the town. The 
 surrounding country is dotted with pretty hamlets, 
 embowered in trees or set in green fields cropped 
 by flocks of sheep, and diversified with broad parks 
 studded with wide-sprealdng oaks and stately mano- 
 rial residences. 
 
 Leaving behind us the roar and rattle of the 
 " junction," we set out through the narrow but 
 cleanly and queerly paved streets of the old town. 
 There seems to be little trade apart from the rail- 
 way traffic and tlie supply of the school. Book- 
 stores abound, in the windows of whicli are exposed 
 for sale photographs of the school, of the beautiful 
 chapel, quadrangle, and cloisters, and of favorite 
 masters, as well as the latest number of the news- 
 paper edited and conducted by the scholars. 
 
EuGBY School. 201 
 
 At lengtli, after a ratlier liilly walk, the school 
 gates come in sight at the end of the street; the 
 great oriel window winking and blinking at us 
 through its many tiny panes, while grouped around 
 stand some of the boys looking, as Tom Brown 
 thought, " as if the whole town belonged to them." 
 But they are a cheery-faced and pleasant-voiced lot 
 of fellows, and under the guidance of one of them 
 we are conducted across the quadrangle and into 
 the great dining-hall, whose walls are garnished 
 with tablets to the memory of those Rugby boys 
 who won the highest honors of the school, and wlio 
 afterward achieved fame and honor in the busy 
 world beyond. Among them are the names of 
 Thomas Hughes himself, of Matthew Arnold, son 
 of the good doctor, of Samuel Butler, the classicist, 
 of Dean Stanley, Earl Derby, Walter Savage Landor, 
 and a score of others equally eminent. Here we 
 are introduced to one of the tutors, by whom we 
 are courteously guided through the historic pile. 
 First into tlie recitation rooms, with bare floors and 
 vvalls, and having only hard wooden "forms" and 
 desks, bearing many scars inflicted by the ruthless 
 pocket-knives of generations of boys, and with great 
 yawning, cavernous fire-places at either end. 
 
202 SciiooL-BoY Life in Meerie England. 
 
 Then into the ''studies" — the private rooms of 
 the scholars — such as Tom Brown became the de- 
 lighted possessor of, the description of which is as 
 true to the life in our day as in his : 
 
 " It wasn't very large, certainly, being about six 
 feet long by four broad. It couldn't be called'light, 
 as there were bars and a grating to the window, 
 which little precautions were necessary in the studies 
 on the ground-floor, looking out into the close, to 
 prevent the exit of small boys after locking up, and 
 the entrance of contraband articles. But it was un- 
 commonly comfortable to look at, Tom thought. The 
 space under the window at the farther end was occu- 
 pied by a square table, covered w^ith a reasonably 
 clean and whole red-and-blue-check table cloth ; a 
 hard-seated sofa, covered with red stuff, occupied one 
 side, running up to the end, and making a seat for 
 one, or, by sitting close, for two, at the table ; and a 
 good, stout wooden chair afforded a seat to another 
 boy, so that three could sit and work together. The 
 walls were wainscoted half way up, the wainscot being 
 covered with green baize, the remainder with a bright- 
 patterned paper. 
 
 " Over the door was a row of Jiat-pegs, and on 
 each side book-cases with cupboards at the bottom ; 
 
KcGBY School. 203 
 
 shelves and cupboards being filled indiscriminately 
 with school-books, a cup or two, a mouse-trap, and 
 brass candlesticks, leather straps, a fustian bag, and 
 some curious-looking articles wliich puzzled Tom not 
 a little until his friend explained that were climbing- 
 irons, and showed their use. A cricket-bat and small 
 Hshing-rod stood up in one corner." 
 
 The room is still pointed out where Arthur said 
 his prayers, and the room where, in Tom Brown's 
 day, the old scholai's used to toss the new boys in 
 blankets. 
 
 Then to the chapel, where we see the " oaken 
 pulpit, standing out by itself above the school scats ; " 
 and though the deserted chamber echoes only our 
 own footsteps and our own hushed voices, we can in 
 imagination see the noble form of Arnold the Good, 
 and in fancy listen to his voice, " now soft as the low 
 notes of a flute, now clear and stirring as the call of 
 a light infantr}^ bugle, as he stood there, Sunday after 
 Sunday, witnessing and pleading for his Lord, the 
 King of righteousness and love and glory, with 
 whose Spirit he was filled, and in whose name he 
 spoke." Fitting is it that his ashes should repose 
 beneath the altar of the chapel within whose walls 
 some of his best work was done, and that his desk 
 
204 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 and chair should be treasured as relics of great 
 price. 
 
 Next out-of-doors again, to the foot ball and the 
 cricket fields, where matches are in progress ; to the 
 fives courts and round the great play-ground, all 
 alive with white-trousered and short-jacketed boys, 
 from the child of eight years to the youth of nineteen 
 or twenty. 
 
 JSTow let us peep at the home life of the great 
 school family. For the benefit of those who have 
 not read " Tom Brown," I may say that the school is 
 divided into various " houses," one of which a boy 
 enters when he joins the school, precisely as, on going 
 up to the universities of Oxford or Cambridge, he 
 enters some particular " college." Rugby has eight 
 of these " houses," and each is under the care of its 
 own house-master, who receives the appointed fees, 
 provides for the table and other household expenses, 
 and assumes the profit or the loss — generally the 
 former, and a handsome one at that. Superior to all 
 the house-masters is the head-master. A house- 
 master's salary — or profit — will range from one thou- 
 sand to six thousand dollars a year, while the income 
 of the head-master, derived from fees and other 
 revemies, is at Rugby about fifteen thousand dollars 
 
KuGBY School. 205 
 
 a year. But in addition to the rule of the head- 
 master (the power felt, but not seen), and that of tlie 
 house-master, each " house " is ruled by two Fifth or 
 Sixth Form boys, who are largely responsible for its 
 order at all times, who settle petty disputes between 
 the boys, and who are supposed to see to it that no 
 bullying, or sneaking, or viciousness goes unpun- 
 ished. Upon the character of these monitors largely 
 depends the house for its good or bad order. 
 
 Every pupil now has his own room for purposes 
 of study. There are dormitories in which all sleep, 
 and sitting-rooms where they gather for social pur- 
 poses ; but each boy has his own six-by-four sanctum 
 in which, when he " sports his oak " — that is, shuts 
 his door — no one may disturb him. This is an un- 
 written law, but none the less sacredly kept. 
 
 At half past six every morning in summer, and at 
 seven o'clock in winter, the dormitories are the scenes 
 of much excitement. Sleepy little boys are routed 
 out of their warm nests by livelier urchins ; lazy boys 
 slowly drag on their clothes ; mischievous boys play 
 mad pranks with the portable property of their neigh- 
 bors, and unwilling or laggard fegs go snail-like on 
 some errand for his majesty the Sixth Form boy. 
 
 Dressing over, chapel bell rings at seven or seven- 
 
206 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mp:reie England. 
 
 tJiirtj, wliich is followed fifteen minutes later bj tlie 
 first lesson of the day. Then comes breakfast at a 
 quarter past eight. At nine-fifteen comes second 
 lesson, followed at eleven by third lesson, and thus, 
 with brief intermissions, the morning hours pass until 
 half-past one, when the great bell tolls for dinner. 
 There are two more recitations after dinner, but 
 school is "usually over by three o'clock, when two 
 hours' play is allowed, until tea-time, at five-thirty. 
 In the evening, when tea is over, the boys prepare 
 their lessons, the little fellows having tutors four 
 evenings in the week, wdiile the upper forms study 
 alone in their rooms. 
 
 Tucsdaj, Thursday, and Saturday afternoons there 
 are no lessons, and, after "calling over," football, 
 cricket, or hare-and-hounds is in order, according to 
 the season. On everj^ third Monday there is another 
 half-holiday, called " middle week." No one know^s 
 or remembers how " middle week " originated ; it is 
 an unwritten law which the Eugbeians hope will 
 never be repealed. 
 
 The fact is, however, that at certain seasons of the 
 year, notably the Christmas and spring terms, the 
 " play " on these half-holidays becomes really hard 
 work, for immediately after '' C. O." (Rugby slang 
 
Rugby School. 2 7 
 
 for "calling over") every able-bodied boy, great and 
 small, plucky or cowardly, except those in temporary 
 ill health, must join in the game of football, or else 
 run with the hounds across country. What these 
 mandates mean every boy will understand who has 
 read " Tom Brown," and recalls the thrilhng descrip- 
 tion therein of the first football game witnessed by 
 the hero, or the laughable account of the run of the 
 Big Side Hare and Hounds, and the mishaps that fell 
 to the lot of the trio East, Tom, and Tadpole. 
 
 Once upon a time Rugbeians wore little cocked 
 hats and queues, and cadets of noble houses were in 
 addition allowed to sport scarlet coats. But nowadays 
 the boys are only required to dress in dark suits of 
 clothes on ordinary occasions, black and white straw 
 hats for every-day wear, with tall silk hats for dress 
 occasions. Curiously enough, during a boy's first 
 three terms the ribbon around his hat must be black, 
 but after that it may be of any color under the sun. 
 For football and cricket, however, white trowsers are 
 the correct thing. 
 
 From the moment of his entrance at Rugby, and 
 his taking up with a certain " house," the boy begins 
 to shift for himself. His house gives him a simple 
 breakfast of tea and bread and butter ; any thing else 
 
208 School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 lie desires, such as eggs, water-cresses, marmalade, 
 potted meats or game, he provides for himself out of 
 his allowance of spending money from home. The 
 boys all eat together. Dinner is provided by the 
 " house," and consists of roast beef or mutton, one 
 vegetable, bread ad libitum^ beer, and a simple des- 
 sert. A plentiful tea is furnished at six o'clock, and 
 the day may be topped off with a hearty supper of 
 bread and cheese, cold meat, and beer, before going to 
 bed, according to the English custom. The boys 
 sleep together in dormitories holding from twenty to 
 tliirty boys, the various sleeping-rooms being presided 
 over by a Sixth Form boy, called a praepostor. The 
 entire school is divided into classes, or " forms," ac- 
 cording to scholarship and irrespective of " houses." 
 The Sixth Form — the highest — are allowed to break- 
 fast in their own rooms, and are also privileged in 
 another important respect. The mention of this 
 brings us to a feature peculiar to the English public 
 schools. 
 
 Such services as polishing shoes, running errands, 
 brushing clothes, shopping, " foraging " for meals, 
 making tea and toast, serving at fives, and bowling 
 at practice games of cricket, and the like, are per- 
 formed for the Sixth Form boy by a little fellow in 
 
Rugby School. 209 
 
 one of the three lowest forms. This is " fagging." 
 The " fag " may be, and often is, the scion of a peer, 
 while the senior may be the son of a butcher — it 
 makes no diiference ; the customs of the school efface 
 all social distinctions, and the fag learns to take it as 
 a matter of course. It is useless to rebel against this 
 time-honored usage, as the experience of the poet 
 Shelley shows. At the age of thirteen he was sent 
 to Eton, and indignantly refused to fag for any one. 
 This drew down on him the anger and indignation of 
 the other boys, and his life became a burden. " His 
 painful experiences at this period," says one of his 
 biographers, " contributed much, no doubt, to the de- 
 velopment of that intense hated of established wrong 
 which afterward became the ruling passion of his 
 life." True enough, says the Old Boy, " the general 
 system was rough and hard, and there was bullying in 
 nooks and corners, but it never got farther, or dared 
 show itself openly, stalking about the passages and 
 halls and bed-rooms, and making the life of the 
 small boys a continual fear." 
 
 But there is for the fag this cold comfort — every 
 boy lias been a fag at some time in his school career. 
 Sometimes the fag's duties are merely nominal ; in 
 
 other cases he will serve an exacting master, and will 
 14 
 
210 School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 have to bolt liis meals in order to attend to the wants 
 of some young autocrat and get up his own lessons. 
 Tlien, of course, there must be more or less bullying 
 under such a system, and that gross tyranny wliicli 
 strong and lusty boys are often too prone to exercise 
 over weaker ones ; but, despite these evils, it is doubt- 
 ful if the custom of fagging is really harmful. It is 
 certainly of benefit in that it is the universal leveler 
 of public-school life. 
 
 Yery often, too, the fag's patron becomes a sort of 
 protector against the petty meannesses of other boys, 
 and there are instances on record of close life-friend- 
 ships born of tliis early relation of fag and the one 
 fagged for. 
 
 One result of this kind of school training must, I 
 fancy, be clear. The boy at the public school is 
 pitched on his feet among his fellows — " like a young 
 bear, with all his troubles before liim " — to stand or 
 fall among them on his own merits of mental or bod- 
 ily prowess ; and while the ordeal is doubtless a try- 
 ing one to the weak or the foolish, yet the sense of 
 personal responsibility induced, which Dr. Arnold 
 was so fond of inculcating, must in most cases make 
 a boy high-spirited and manly. 
 
 But fagging has seen its best (or worst) days. 
 
Rugby School. 211 
 
 Nowadays only the Sixth Form can have fags, and 
 even the duties are trivial compared with those 
 exacted in the past. '^ Think of a boy having to warm 
 three or four beds on a bitter cold night by lying in 
 them until the warmth of his body had destroyed 
 their chill, and then having to rise at four o'clock 
 next morning to run two miles to the Avon to attend 
 to the fishing-lines of the Sixth Form boys, and be 
 back in time for first lesson ! Fancy his being obliged 
 to form one of a team of four or twelve in harness to 
 be raced around the school-yard, or ' close,' by the prae- 
 postor of the Four-in-Hand Club, and compelled to 
 make flower-beds for the same mighty being, having 
 half a pewter spoon and a whole table-fork for his 
 only garden tools, and the flowers to be supplied by 
 fair means or foul ! Yet these are only a few speci- 
 mens of the tasks formerly set a fag." 
 
 The sports most in vogue at Rugby are foot-ball, 
 cricket, fives — described in the chapter on Eton Col- 
 lege — and hare-and-hounds. The river is not adapted 
 for rowing, but there are good swimming-grounds, 
 though none but swimmers are allowed to bathe ex- 
 cept under the care of an usher. The fives court is 
 a building with solid walls, and the game is played as 
 at Eton. On one side of the play-ground are a num- 
 
212 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 ber of courts similar to those at Eton, where the 
 game is played against the buttressed walls, so that 
 the Rugbeian can play this spirited game under the 
 same conditions as obtain at Eton, where the game is 
 believed to have originated. 
 
 Rugby football has passed into a proverb, and the 
 rules which govern the game as played there are in 
 vogue on this side of the Atlantic as well as in Aus- 
 tralia — wherever, in fact, the game is " scientifically " 
 played. It is played chiefly during the Christmas 
 term, and every Rugby boy, says one who was not 
 long ago head of the school-house team, " looks for- 
 ward to it in the summer and regrets it in the spring. 
 He honors good football players and despises poor 
 ones. He will talk football in season and out of sea- 
 son." Rugby football is a very different affair from 
 the Eton or the Harrow game, being far rougher, 
 though old Rugbeians deplore the fact that it is not 
 played half so heartily as it used to be. But even 
 now it is rough enough for safety, as any one who 
 has witnessed an inter-collegiate game on this side the 
 Atlantic can testify. In former days at Rugby the 
 contests between the giants of the upper bench (the 
 first twelve) of the Sixth Form and the school-house 
 were really pitched battles, and more than once the 
 
Rugby School. 213 
 
 masters had to interfere to prevent serious physical 
 injury. 
 
 It is not so very long ago that a set of " revised 
 rules" were agreed to, with the object of making the 
 sport less brutal, one of them being to this effect : 
 
 " Though it is lawful to hold any player in a maul, 
 this holding does not include attempts to throttle or 
 strangle, which are totally opposed to all the princi- 
 ples of the game." 
 
 And again we read : 
 
 "No one wearing projecting nails or iron plates on 
 the soles or heels of his boots or shoes shall be 
 allowed to play." 
 
 These "revised rules" (surely they needed revis- 
 ing ! ) afford some idea of what Rugby football once 
 was. Does not little Tom East exclaim with pride : 
 " None of your private school games ! Why, there's 
 been two collar-bones broken this half, and a dozen 
 fellows lamed, while last year a fellow broke his leg 
 in a scrimmage ! " In fact, the technical terms 
 "mauling," "butting," "scrimmage," "tripping," 
 etc., still in vogue, show that the game is only for 
 the swift and the strong, even in its milder modern 
 form. 
 
 Nevertheless, Rugby football is a noble and exiiil- 
 
214: School-Boy Life m Merrie England. 
 
 arating game — for those who like it. Long may the 
 sport flourish in its classic English home under the 
 " beautiful line of elms," around " the island in the 
 farthest corner," and the three trees which, as East 
 pointed out to Tom, were " such a tremendous place 
 when the ball hangs there." All these landmarks 
 may still be seen by the pilgrim who turns his feet 
 toward the classic old school town. The chief matches 
 of the season are those between the Sixth Form and 
 the whole school and that between the "Old Rugs" 
 and those of the present, when the last and the pres- 
 ent generation mingle in the game they all worship. 
 In point of popularity hare-and-hounds stands 
 next in the Rugbeian's heart of hearts, and partici- 
 pation therein is as compulsory as in cricket or foot- 
 ball — save, of course, for those in poor health. There 
 are two kinds of runs — the " House " and the " Big 
 Side." The House runs are over shorter distances, 
 and take place in the early part of the season, and 
 in these the little fellows are helped over the Iiard 
 places by their stronger or more experienced com- 
 rades. But in the Big Side runs the whole school 
 turns out, when " every man for himself " is the 
 watchword for the day. Of course the little chaps 
 often come to grief, as did Tom and East and the 
 
Rugby School. 215 
 
 Tadpole, their experience being, as Mrs. Pennell 
 says, " that of every E-ugbeian. The runs are neces- 
 sarily made every year over the same ground, and in 
 whicliever direction the boys go they must cross 
 plowed fields or green meadows witli sheej) scatter- 
 ing on every side ; they must leap over hedges and 
 brooks, mount little hills, and jump ditches. And 
 fortunate they are, indeed, if the sun shines and the 
 grass is dry, and the roads hard ; for in rainy England 
 in the writer and early spring the chances are that 
 rain or fog will add to the trials of a run. It is hard 
 work, of course ; but, tiresome as the runs are, the 
 boys find real pleasure and satisfaction in them," 
 while the excellent bodily training thus engendered, 
 making the young athletes " sound in wind and limb," 
 is worth striving after, even at the pains of torn 
 clothes and bruised limbs. 
 
 The " school steeple- chase," as the last great run 
 of the year is named, is purposely laid out over tlie 
 roughest bit of country in the vicinity — over hill 
 and dale, across ditch and drain, river and brook, 
 plowed land and upland furrow. He who would 
 come in first must be prepared to face many a duck- 
 ing and many a tumble, but as a reward he will be 
 looked up to as a hero among his fellows, and his 
 
216 School Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 name will be handed down to successive generations 
 of Rugbeians. 
 
 The summer game is cricket. But Rugby cricket, 
 though a finely played game, cannot compare with that 
 of Eton or Harrow, nor is it followed with the same 
 intensity as the other sports. Then, the racquet and 
 the fives courts have their attractions. Boating there is 
 none, though swimming may be enjoyed in the Avon 
 or in the fine new bath in the school close. Besides 
 these more active forms of amusement, there are 
 botanical, geological, entomological, and archaeolog- 
 ical societies, a bicycle club, debating and Shakes- 
 peare societies, and the school magazine ; so that the 
 liugbeian need not lack for recreation to agree with 
 his particular bent. For those w^iose bent is toward 
 a soldier's life there is a volunteer company, entitled 
 *'F Company, 2d Yolunteer Battalion Eoyal War- 
 wickshire Eegiment," officered and manned by 
 Eugbeians. 
 
 We have seen how the Eugby boys eat, and sleep, 
 and play, but they also have to work. The number 
 of scholars is about five hundred, and tliough nearly 
 all the public schools were aft'ected by the Public 
 Schools Act of 1868, Eugby among the rest, and 
 marked changes — mostly for the better — were made 
 
Rugby School. 217 
 
 in the studies pursued and in the mode of teaching, 
 yet the Rugby of to-day is not essentially different 
 from the Rugby of fifty years ago. 
 
 Latin and Greek, as in all these schools, are among 
 the principal studies, boys from nine to fifteen read- 
 ing Horace, Livy, and Yirgil, and Homer and Eurip- 
 ides, in the original, translating, construing, and 
 parsing. To these are added history, grammar, 
 music, chemistry, science, Bible study, drawing, natu- 
 ral history, and mathematics, the last in the higher 
 forms. The list of prizes to be striven for is a long and 
 valuable one. Thus, among many other incentives, 
 prizes are given every year for collections of wild 
 flowers, insects, and fossils, made in the neighborhood 
 of Rugby. A prize is given for collections of dried 
 plants made anywhere in ths summer holidays. A 
 prize is given for a collection of Lepidoptera (butter- 
 flies and moths) made anywhere in the summer holi- 
 days. They must be arranged and labeled with the 
 Latin names. All of these prizes are open to the 
 whole school. An old Rugbeian gives a prize of the 
 value of three guineas annually for the boy in the 
 sixth form who in the July examination stands first 
 in general Bible knowledge and in the special Greek 
 Testament subject. 
 
218 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 Rugby School is jDeculiiirly favored by the country- 
 squire class and the smaller landed gentry of England. 
 If not so famous, so costly, or so richly endowed as 
 Eton or Harrow, its educational advantages are 
 quite as great ; and while the Kugbeian may not 
 rub shoulders every day in the week with the son of 
 my Lord This or Sir Somebody Else, yet he will 
 find himself among youngsters in whose veins runs 
 some of the best and sturdiest blood in England, and 
 from whose ranks will be recruited the men wdio are 
 to make the history of their countiy in the not far- 
 off future. 
 
HARROW SCHOOL 
 
 JHotto : 
 
 "STET FORTUNA DOM US." 
 
Harrow School. 
 
 Three leagues to north of London town 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 There stands a school of high renown, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill I 
 Low at her feet the rolling shire, 
 Groves around her in green attire. 
 And soaring above her a silent spire, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill! 
 
 Men of honor in English realms, .^^ 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 Have roamed as boys beneath her elms, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 And round the school which loves to claim 
 The heirloom of their noble name 
 They cast the halo of their fame, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 
 Others may boast of a Founder-King, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 We have a different birth to sing, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill I 
 Glorious founders have there been, 
 But never grander pair were seen 
 Than Yeoman John and the Virgin Queen, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 
222 School-Boy Life in jMkkrik England. 
 
 And if Lliey ask what made lier great, 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill ! 
 "Was it her riches, pride, or fate ? 
 
 Harrow up on the Hill 1 
 Say that she rose because she would. 
 Because her sons were wise and good, 
 And bound in closest brotherhood, 
 
 Harrow upon the Hill! — Harrow School Song. 
 
 ARROW, or Harrow on-the- Hill, the 
 ^ Ilarewe-atte-IIull of the Sax- 
 ons, so great is its antiquity, is a 
 W^ quaint old town of Middlesex, finely 
 planted on the summit of a high hill, 
 miles N.N.W. of London. The drive 
 Ither by road is most picturesque and enjoy- 
 able, and the speedier Underground Railway 
 lands the pilgrim within a half mile of the town — 
 a long half mile, all up hill. On one hand the way 
 is bordered by stately trees, through which gleam the 
 gables of thatched cottages or red-tiled mansions ; on 
 the left " green meadows stretch away toward London 
 until the eye loses them in a hazy outline of oak and 
 elm against a dull, mysterious-looking sky. For 
 three hundred years one of the great public schools 
 of England has held intellectual court on the sloping 
 mount of this ancient Harrow, which had a local 
 
IIaukow School. 223 
 
 i.iibitatioii and a name before the Norman Con- 
 (|uest." 
 
 From this hill at Harrow, ten miles from the 
 marble arch at Hyde Park, the writer of Sahurhan 
 Homes of London tells us, the view toward the east 
 is bounded by the metropolis ; that to the south looks 
 on the Crystal Palace and the Surrey Hills ; that on 
 the south-east extends from Knockholt Beeches to 
 Shooter's Hill and across the Thames to the Langdon 
 Hills on the Essex side. '^ The west and south-west 
 is especially beautiful from the church-yard, includ- 
 ing Windsor Castle and a great part of the counties 
 of Berkshire and Bucks. The north is least com- 
 manding, but singularly rich, including Hampstead, 
 Hendon, and Barnet." 
 
 Harrow contains many fine old dwellings, but the 
 chief interest centers around the ancient church and 
 the grammar school. The former is at least seven 
 centuries old, and in its shadow lie many generations 
 of the inhabitants of the country-side, while quaint 
 tombstones and odd inscriptions abound. Here rest 
 the remains of John Lyon, founder of Harrow, and 
 near by what is known as " Byron's tomb," from the 
 poet's fondness therefor, is inclosed in an iron cage 
 to preserve it from the vandal hand of the relic- 
 
22J: SciJOOL-BoY Life in Merrib England. 
 
 hunter. Byron's daughter, Allegra, is buried in the 
 church. " There is," the poet wrote to Murray, *' a 
 spot in the cliurch-yard, near the footpath on the 
 brow of the hill looking toward Windsor, where I 
 used to sit for hours and hours when I was a boy ; 
 this was my favorite spot, but as I wish to erect a 
 tablet to her memory, her body had better be de- 
 posited in the church." From the church spire, four 
 hundred feet above the Thames, a noble view may 
 be had, and the spire itself forms a conspicuous ob- 
 ject in the landscape for miles around. On this 
 account Charles II. called Harrow Church " the visi- 
 ble church." 
 
 Harrow, we are told, has a history full of anti- 
 quarian interest and historic romance : 
 
 Thomas a Becket held state here, and Wolsey was rector of 
 the parish and lived in a moated house still to be found by 
 the pedestrian. And, as in other suburban towns and vil- 
 lages about London, the past and the present are pleasantly 
 linked together by a hostelry that seems to belong to the 
 coaching days, and suggests the time when the well-mounted 
 highwayman was a picturesque though dangerous incident of 
 the great roads that lead in and out of the metropolis. There 
 is the swinging sign courting the breeze where probably the 
 cross of the olden times reared aloft its Christian symbol. 
 The inn has a quaint appearance, quietly retiring from the 
 road, its window-panes fairly blinking with geniality. It 
 
Hakrow School. 225 
 
 has a bar redolent of old ale and rum, and a coffee-room where 
 joints of ham and beef, sticks of celery and Gloucestershire 
 cheese, invite the sojourner to physical enjoyment. At the 
 back of the house the old inn has an old-fashioned garden to 
 match its sign, its bar, and its solid English fare. It grows 
 stocks, and daisies, and marigolds, and roses, and ' ' lad's- 
 love," or "old-man; " and beyond the trimmed lawn and the 
 hedge-row that shuts in the flower borders from the grosser 
 forms of vegetation there is a kitchen-garden with apple-trees 
 and asparagus beds and potato patches; and farther away, 
 outside the kitchen-garden, lies that typical English land- 
 scape which had so many charms for Byron. Carriers' carts 
 and family carriages and picnic brakes drive up to that invit- 
 ing way-side inn of suburban London, and foaming tankards 
 are quaffed there by rosy-faced people who look as if they had 
 never seen the great city, though it lies under the mist yonder 
 only a few miles away. 
 
 Harrow School was founded in 1571 by "John 
 Lyon, yeoman." The yeomanry of England are con- 
 sidered as next to the gentry in the social scale. 
 John Lyon w^onld seem to have been a wealthy land- 
 owner. Among other bequests he instituted an arch- 
 ery prize, consisting of a silver arrow, to be shot for 
 annually on August 4; but though observed for over 
 two centuries the custom has been abolished. 
 
 John Lyon lived in the time when the great re- 
 vival of letters was sweeping over England. Schools 
 
 for the common people were few, and the worthy 
 15 
 
22G SuHooL-BoY Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 commoner tlioiiglit that he coiikl do no nobler act 
 than to found a school where the children of his 
 neitJjhbors could be educated. Among other posses- 
 sions he owned a medicinal spring, to which persons 
 traveled from long distances to drink of its waters. 
 The owner suspended a leathern purse in a convenient 
 place, and the visitors could drop therein a few small 
 coins as a thank-olfering. Quite a large revenue re- 
 sulted therefrom, and John Lyon set apart a cei'tain 
 proportion of it to pay for the education of certain 
 poor boys in Harrow. When he was assured that 
 the effort w^as in the right direction he determined 
 to found a permanent home for the school, so that 
 the good work might go on long after he was 
 gathered to his fathers, and the sons of the worthy 
 poor of his native village be taught to the l'akI of 
 tinje. So, as in the case of Ruo'bv, Harrow was 
 originally intended for poor boys, yet through its 
 growth in fame and w^ealth the very class whom the 
 founder hoped to benefit has come to be almost to- 
 tally excluded, and Harrow now ranks with Eton for 
 aristocratic exclusiv^eness, though the school is nom- 
 inally free for boys of the parish. 
 
 In 1751 good Queen Bess granted a charter for 
 the projected school, but it took forty years to 
 
IIakkow School. 227 
 
 build the "well meete and convenient roomes '' for 
 th<3 master, ushers, and scholars, and the school 
 was opened in IGll. TJie old school-house is still 
 standing — built in the extreme Elizabethan style, 
 with pointed gables, and high, narrow, old-fashioned 
 windows. The old school-room on the ground floor, 
 where once all the boys met for recitation and school 
 work, is still used two or three times a week for 
 prayers. "The walls are wainscoted," says Mrs. 
 Pennell, "and all over tlie wainscoting, and on the 
 benches and desks, on the masters' tables, and even 
 on the head-master's chair, school-boys for the last 
 three hundred years have carved their names. Some 
 of these names are large and sprawling, others small 
 and neat, and they are so close together that there 
 is no space for any new ones to be added. On one 
 side, in very large letters, Byron's name is cut in 
 tw^o different places, and near it is that of Peel, the 
 great English statesman. The boys were really for- 
 bidden to do this, and every name represents a 
 severe punishment. But the masters are now very 
 glad that the boys were disobedient, for many be- 
 came famous in after life, and their school-boy 
 carvings are pointed out with pride. Harrovians, as 
 Harrow boys are called, now have their names 
 
228 School-Boy Life in Merkie England. 
 
 carved for them on new panels provided for the pur- 
 pose, and they think it quite an honor." 
 
 The founder of Harrow ruled that in the lower 
 forms the boys should study Latin grammar, Ter- 
 ence, Cicero, and Ovid. In the Lower Fourth Form 
 they were to study Caesar, Cicero, and Virgil, and 
 the same, with the addition of Greek grammar, in 
 the Upper Fourth, which should also be required to 
 write Greek and Latin verses. In the Fifth Form 
 Csesar, Cicero, Livy, and Demosthenes were to be 
 studied, and Greek and Latin verses written. For 
 two hundred and twenty-five years after the found- 
 ing the only change made was that more verse- 
 writing was introduced. In 1829 vulgar fractions, 
 Euclid, geography, and modern history were first 
 studied at this school. In 1837 the study of mathe- 
 matics was made compulsory, and in 1857 modern 
 languages were introduced. The founder of Harrow 
 also prescribed that the recreation of the boys should 
 consist of top-spinning, ball-tossing, archery, and 
 nothing more. On October 22, 1838, the school 
 was damaged by fire, but w^as quickly repaired, and 
 in this way some needed improvements were come at, 
 while the Public Schools act of 1868 greatljMnodified 
 and regulated the internal economy of Harrow. 
 
Hareow School. 229 
 
 From the foregoing it will be seen that the school 
 is greatly changed since John Lyon's day. ^Not only 
 have the buildings and the studies been modernized 
 and enlarged, with shorter hours for study and more 
 time for play, but the entire personnel of the school 
 is changed. Nowadays the boys who go to Harrow 
 are not poor free scholars, but well-to-do paying 
 pupils — in fact, so much is paid that none but chil- 
 dren of wealthy people can afford to enter. When 
 John Lyon directed that the master could receive, 
 besides the regular scholars, so many " foreigners " — • 
 that is, boys from other parts of England — he little 
 thought that the number of these outsiders would 
 become so large, attracted by the high reputation of 
 the school, that there would be over five hundred of 
 them, while there would be only five or six " founda- 
 tioners,", or free scholars. Yet so it is to-day. 
 
 None but the free scholars board in the school 
 proper. All others live with the different masters 
 in the town, in some fifteen or twenty residences. 
 Some of the larger " houses " accommodate forty 
 boys ; some contain only a dozen, the average being 
 twenty-five. Two or three boys room together in 
 the dormitories, but all dine together ''in hall" 
 with the master, only Sixth Form boys being allowed 
 
230 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 to have breakfast and tea in solitary grandenr, 
 waited on by their fags. In some of the smaller 
 houses the boys eat with the master's family, and 
 the arrangement is a very enjoyable one — for the 
 boys. In the dormitories every boy has what is 
 called a " Harrow bed " — a peculiar iron cot, which 
 in the day-time is folded up out of sight and stored 
 in a convenient closet. 
 
 The one punishment for all offenses at Harrow is 
 the writing of Greek and Latin lines. If a boy is 
 late for " locking-up," he writes so many lines; if 
 he does not answer to his name at "bill" he writes 
 lines : for each and every offense against school or- 
 der or discipline the penalty is " lines ; " and if the 
 imposition be not finished by the next " bill," the 
 punishment is doubled. Mrs. Pennell tells the story 
 of a clever boy who on one occasion managed to 
 escape writing half the quantity set, and this is how 
 he did it : 
 
 He was an untidy boy, and was often taken to task for 
 his carelessness and disorder. One day his master, who had 
 very dignified and impressive manners, and who always said 
 "we" instead of ''you" when talking to the boys, found 
 occasion to reprove him. "We do not look very clean," he 
 said, with much severity. "We have not washed our hands 
 this morning, have we ?" "I don't know about yours," was 
 
IIakkow (School. 231 
 
 the impudent reply, "but I've waslied mine." "Ah!" yaid 
 the master, "we are very imjiertinent to-day. We will have 
 to write a hundred lines before next bill." When bill time 
 came the master sent for the boy. "Have we written our 
 lines ? " he asked. "I've written my fifty," the boy answered 
 very promptly, handing in his paper, "but I don't know 
 whether j^ouVe done your half." 
 
 The masters chuckle over the story to tliis clay. 
 The mention of being late for " locking up " recalls 
 another story of outwitting a master : 
 
 Once, on a very dark night, the head-master saw about 
 half a dozen boys coming out of the village inn, where they 
 had been positively forbidden to go. He could not see their 
 faces, and as they all ran as soon as lie spoke to them, he only 
 succeeded in seizing one of their numl)er. Pulling out his 
 knife he cut a tail from this boy's coat and let him go, saying, 
 "Now, sir, you may go home. I will know you in class to- 
 morrow morning by this." The next morning came, and the 
 head-master w^aited at his desk, ready to punish his victim 
 with great severity, for the offense was counted a very serious 
 one. But when the boys of his form came in, and passed, 
 one by one, in front of the desk, each had but a single tail to 
 his coat. They all had ruined their "tails" to save their 
 friend. 
 
 Every " house " at Harrow is a law unto itself so 
 far as respects its internal government. Each has 
 its own peculiar customs, its rivalries with the other 
 houses at cricket, foot-ball, and swimming, while the 
 rules as to fagging vary in severity in the various 
 
232 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mekeie England. 
 
 houses. As a natural result membersliip in a cer- 
 tain one is often eagerly sought for, and vacancies 
 are bespoken years ahead. 
 
 Shining indeed is the roll of Harrow's illustrious 
 scholars. Among them stand out with peculiar 
 brightness sucli names as Lord Palmerston ; Tlieo- 
 dore Hook ; Sheridan ; Shendon ; Dr. Samuel Parr, 
 who was usher from 1767-72 ; Percival ; Thomas Gis- 
 borne, the essayist ; Sir WilHam Jones, the philoso- 
 pher ; Charles Wordsworth, Bishop of St. Andrews ; 
 Lord Byron, and Sir Robert Peel — the two last 
 named having been classmates. In a note to the 
 fourth canto of Childe Harold the poet says, 
 regarding his leaving Harrow for Cambridge in 
 ISOC) : 
 
 "When I first went up to college it was a new 
 and heavy-hearted scene for me. I so much disliked 
 leaving Harrow that, though it was time (I being 
 seventeen), it broke my rest for the last quarter with 
 counting the days that remained. I always hated 
 Harrow till the last year and a half, but tlien I 
 liked it." 
 
 His lines on the school, written in 1806, deserve 
 to rank with Gray's relating to Eton, and are here 
 reproduced in full : 
 
Harrow School. 233 
 
 on a distant view of the village and scliool op 
 h arrow-on-tu e-hill. 
 
 " 0! mihi praeteritos referat si Jupiter annos."— Virgil. 
 
 Ye scenes of my cliildliood, whose loved recollection 
 Embitters tlie present, compared with the past; 
 
 Where science first dawn'd on the powers of reflection. 
 And friendships were form'd too romantic to last; 
 
 Where fancy yet joys to trace the resemblance 
 Of comrades, in friendship and mischief allied. 
 
 How welcome to me your ne'er-fading remembrance, 
 Which rests in the bosom, though hope is denied ! 
 
 Again I revisit the hills where we sported, 
 
 The streams where we swam, and the fields where we fought ; 
 The school where, loud warn'd by the bell, we resorted, 
 
 To pore o'er the precepts by pedagogues taught. 
 
 Again I behold where for hours I have ponder'd, 
 As reclining, at eve, on yon tombstone I lay ; 
 
 Or round the steep brow of the churchyard I wander'd, 
 To catch the last gleam of the sun's setting ray. 
 
 I once more view the room, with spectators surrounded, 
 Where, as Zanga, I trod on Alonzo o'erthrown ; 
 
 While to swell my young pride such applauses resounded, 
 I fancied that Mossop himself was outshone. 
 
 Or, as Lear, I pour'd forth the deep imprecation, 
 By my daughters of kingdom and reason deprived; 
 
 Till fired by loud plaudits and self-adulation, 
 I regarded myself as a Garrick revived. 
 
 Te dreams of my boyhood, how mucli T regret you ! 
 
 Unfaded your memory dwells in my breast ; 
 Though sad and deserted, I ne'er can forget you : 
 
 Your pleasures may still be in fancy possessed. 
 
23i SciiooL-BoY LiFH IN Mekiuk England. 
 
 To Ida full oft may remembrance restore me, 
 While fate shall the shades of the future unroll! 
 
 Since darkness o'ersliadows the prospect before me, 
 More dear is the beam of the past to my soul. 
 
 But if through the course of the years which await me, 
 Some new scene of pleasure should open to view, 
 
 I will say, while with rapture the thouglit shall elale me, 
 " 01 such were the days wliicli ni}^ infancy knew! " 
 
 It was at Harrow Scliool tliat tlicre began one of 
 those rare school-boy friendships that last a life-time, 
 between Byron and Lord Clare. Ten years later 
 they met in Italy, and of this encounter Byron says : 
 " This meeting annihihited for a moment all the years 
 between the present and the days at Harrow. . . . "VVe 
 were but fiv^e minutes together, and on the public 
 road, but I hardly recollect an hour of my existence 
 which could be wei«:lied as^ainst them." In Hours 
 of Idleness a poem is addressed to Lord Clare which 
 recalls the boyish days of both at Harrow : 
 
 " Friend of my youtli ! when young we roved. 
 Like striplings mutually beloved, 
 
 With friendship's purest glow: 
 Tlie bliss which winged those rosy hours 
 Was such as pleasure seldom showers 
 
 On mortals here below." 
 
 Love for the school and an intense esj)rit du corps 
 distiniruish Harrovians even more than Etonians or 
 
Hakeow School. 235 
 
 Kugbeians. They implicitly believe that Harrow and 
 all it contains are far ahead of all other schools. Al- 
 though the towers of Eton may be seen from the top 
 of Harrow Hill nestling in the vale below, you will 
 never hear a word at Harrow indicating the near 
 neighborship of so great a rival. "Even Harrow 
 masters pretend to know nothing of the manners and 
 customs of the school near Windsor." This school 
 feeling survives till gray hairs appear, and is proof 
 alike against time and distance, and an old Harrovian 
 will put his hand very deep in his pocket if he learns 
 that the dear old school needs lielp of any kind. One 
 of the school songs was written by a former scliool- 
 boy in far away Allahabad in 1864, and the last stanza 
 finely depicts this school feeling : 
 
 " And when at last old age is ours, and manhood's strength has fled, 
 And young ambition's tire is cold, and earthly hope lies dead, 
 Once more amid our earthly haunts we feel our boyhood's thrill, 
 And keep a niche within our hearts for Harrow-on-thc-Hill. 
 For, searching England far and wide, no school can well be found 
 That sends forth truer gentlemen, or stands on higher ground." 
 
 And still another ditty svljs : 
 
 " The Alps and the white Himalayas 
 
 Are all very pleasant to see. 
 But of riglit little, tight little, bright little hills, 
 
 Our Harrow is highest, say we." 
 
23G School-Boy Life in Mereie England. 
 
 All the school songs celebrate the praises of Har- 
 row, of John Lyon, and of good Queen Elizabeth ; 
 they sing of the charter as thougli it were the Great 
 Charter of Enghmd, and are full of the trials and 
 tribulations of new boys and of the noble prowess of 
 the " old boys." Once a week there is singing in 
 each house, on which occasions those boys and masters 
 not similarly engaged come and listen, and very good 
 singing it is ; for the boys are all well trained, and 
 every boy must learn to sing. There was once a 
 laughable and amusing custom, wherein the boys 
 themselves tested the voices of all new-comers. Here 
 is Mrs. Pennell's account of the ceremony : 
 
 " The unfortunate new boy was made to stand on a 
 table holding a lighted candle in each hand, and in 
 this position was made to sing a song. If he failed 
 he was made to drink a glass of soap and water. 
 Something of this kind also occurred in the Christmas 
 term. All the boys in a house would meet in a room, 
 and the ' Footer Eleven,' clad in red dressing-gowns, 
 would sit solemnly on a bench in front of a table. 
 On this every boy stood in turn and sang his song, 
 holding, like the new boy, a candle in each hand. On 
 one side was an officer for the evening armed with a 
 toasting-fork ; a second, armed with a racquet, was 
 
IIapvKow ISciiouL. 237 
 
 stationed on the other side. When the singer stopped 
 in his song or liesitated, tlie officers gave him a good 
 thrashing with their weapons. The general result 
 was, as a head-boy once wrote, ' a good deal of fun 
 and some slight damage to the trowsers.' Nowadays 
 in many of the houses the new boys are still forced 
 to sing, but the candles and soap and water are left 
 out of the ceremony. Besides this, at the supper at 
 the end of every term, which is a jolly affair, with 
 much speech-making and many toasts, every boy in 
 tlie house is obliged to sing at least two or three 
 verses of a song. The little fellows look forward to 
 the evening with great fear and trembling, and prac- 
 tice their songs for weeks beforehand." 
 
 The modern side of Harrow School is most pleasing 
 in its architecture, many of its buildings being by Gil- 
 bert Scott. "The latest of all is the new Speech 
 Room, a striking building in red brick, semicircular 
 in form, below the church, near the high road. To 
 the right of this road stand the college chapel, the 
 Yaughan Library — a memorial of a revered head- 
 master — the master's house, and other school build- 
 ings. Passing between them one comes suddenly out 
 upon a long terrace on the other brow of the hill, at 
 one end of which an old dial counts the sunny hours. 
 
23S School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 and whence is another far and lovely view, tlie coun- 
 terpart of that from the church. The master's garden 
 stretches down the hill-side in careless, pleasant fash- 
 ion, as though London and life were of no concern to 
 the sweet idleness of the scholar; while olf at the 
 west, Uxbridge way, is a tract of country said to be 
 the most sparsely inhabited in the home counties." 
 
 Although the head-master has chief control of the 
 school, his is rather the power that is felt but not seen. 
 During school-hours the boys are under the charge of 
 the masters of their classes or forms; out of school, 
 and when in their " houses," they are subject to the 
 masters living there. But once or twice a week the 
 whole school meets in Speech lioom, where the head- 
 master issues such orders as are necessary ; at all 
 other times the only scholars with whom he comes in 
 innncdiate contact are those in his own house and 
 form. 
 
 The first sixteen boys in the highest or Sixth 
 Form are termed monitors ; their authority is next 
 to that of the masters, and in return for certain minor 
 services they are permitted certain small privileges. 
 When on duty they are not compelled to attend 
 classes, and can use the school library at all times, 
 though of course they must study their lessons, so as 
 
IIakkow School. 239 
 
 to not full behind the form. So uuich for the gov- 
 ernment of the school. 
 
 The day's routine is as follows: School begins 
 every morning at 7:30, and lasts until 9 ; from 9 to 
 9:30 is breakfast-time, and then until 10 the boys are 
 at liberty ; from 10 until 1 o'clock the boys are in 
 their classes with only slight intermissions. Dinner 
 is served at 1 o'clock. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and 
 Saturdays are half-holidays. On Mondays, Wednes- 
 days, and Fridays there is school from 3 to 4 and 
 from 5 to 6. Tea comes at 6 ; supper at 8:30 ; 
 prayers at 9:15, and at 10 o'clock the gas is turned 
 off. During the evening, between tea-time and bed- 
 time, the boys are supposed to prepare their work for 
 the next day. On Sundays " chapel" is at 8:30, and 
 a'>-ain at 11 and 6, while at 3 o'clock there is an hour's 
 Scripture lesson, which must be prepared beforehand. 
 On week-days " lock-up " in summer is at 8:30 ; in 
 winter 6:30, and no boy may be out of his house after 
 lock-up. 
 
 On the regular half-holidays the boys are free from 
 all restraint save that they must answer to their names 
 at '' bill" at 1:45, 4, and 6 in the summer term, and 
 at 1:45 and 4:15 in winter. This "bill" is a term 
 peculiar to Harrow, and signifies a roll-call on holi- 
 
210 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mekeie Englan;d. 
 
 days. Tlie observance deserves a paragraph to it- 
 self. 
 
 Precisely at the appointed hour the great school- 
 1) .11 rings — and it can be heard for miles around. 
 The boys come trooping into the school-yard from the 
 swimming pool, from the cricket and foot-ball fields, 
 from the racquet courts, from the cake-shops of the 
 town, or from their own "houses." In a few mo- 
 ments one of the masters, in academic gown and cap, 
 takes his place on the wide stone steps, the monitor of 
 the day at his side, and proceeds to call the roll of the 
 entire school. Every boy must be either " present or 
 iiccounted for," as they say in the army. All romp- 
 ing stops, and silence reigns. In regular order the 
 names are called, from the highest form to the lowest, 
 and the boys in single file march past, and each one 
 answers in turn, touching the brim of his hat, " Here, 
 sir!" The names of the missing ones are taken 
 down by the monitor, and before the day closes he 
 has to find them and the reason for their absence, 
 and report to the master. The penalty for missing 
 " bill " is fifty lines of Greek or Latin. 
 
 Harrow is divided into the Upper and the Lower 
 School. The Sixth Form is the highest in the 
 school ; it has three divisions, and usually numbers 
 
Harrow School. 241 
 
 about seventy-five boys. Next in rank is tlie Fifth 
 Form, wliicli also has tliree divisions. Next in order 
 come the Upper and tiie Modern Eemoves, all of the 
 foregoing constituting the Upper School, the boys in 
 which wear " tails," or tailed coats. In the Lower 
 School, where the boys wear jackets, the highest 
 classes are the two Lower Removes ; these are fol- 
 lowed by three " Shells ; " * and lowest of all is the 
 Fourth Form, which has also three divisions. All 
 these divisions are rather hard to remember, so they 
 are tabulated below : 
 
 Sixth Form 
 
 Three Divisions. 
 Fifth Form 
 
 Three Divisions. 
 Upper Remove 
 Modern Remove J 
 
 Two Lower Removes ] 
 
 Three Shells ^ 
 
 ^ J- Lower School. 
 
 Fourth Form i 
 
 Three Divisions. J 
 
 When not studying in school the boys are allowed 
 great freedom, and are virtually their own masters. 
 
 * This term is a corruption of the French word echelle, "ladder." 
 Formerly there were no " removes," and the "shells" were the steps 
 leading from the Lower to the Upper School. 
 16 
 
 Upper School. 
 
242 ScnooL-BoY Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 Provided tliej are present at •' bill " and " lock-up " 
 the intervening time for play may be spent at pleas- 
 ure. True enough, there are certain bounds set to 
 their excursions abroad, and there are likewise certain 
 things they must not do ; but there are no beadles or 
 proctors to spy upon them, and the result is a healthy 
 independence and self-reliance. Fagging is the only 
 bugbear, for at Harrow the rules and regulations 
 which define the time-honored custom are very 
 minute. 
 
 In some of the smaller houses there is not and 
 never has been any fagghig, and there is an un- 
 written law of the school wdiich says that a boy who 
 has never been a fag cannot have a fag! So when 
 a boy, in course of time, moves from a fagless house 
 into a larger one on entering the Sixth Form " he 
 must first serve his apprenticeship before he acquires 
 the right to give orders to a fag." For a period of 
 time varying from a day to a fortniglit the big fellow 
 waits on the other big fellows of the Sixth Form, who 
 plague him with long errands and the most trifling 
 duties. 
 
 The Sixth Form is the only one in the school per- 
 mitted to have fags. " Their baths and their fires, 
 their meals and their messages, are attended to by 
 
Hakrow School. 243 
 
 the younger bo.ys." The Fiftli Form and its three 
 divisions form an intermediate class — they are not 
 old enough to be allowed the luxury of fags, and yet 
 they themselves are deemed too big to serve as such. 
 Dut all the other boys, from the two Upper Eemoves 
 downward, including the whole of the Lower School, 
 have to take turns at fagging. '* Each one is on 
 duty for a certain length of time, as 'day-fag,' 
 ' night-fag,' or ' find-%.' The day-fag has to stay 
 in his house all day long in case he may be wanted. 
 He has to keep the fires of the Sixth Form boys 
 burning, and he must fill their baths after foot- 
 ball, and empty their basins in the evening. The 
 find-fag is the marketer; that is, he goes to the 
 tuck-shop for sausages, or eggs, or whatever deli- 
 cacy it may please his master to order. The night- 
 fags run on messages during the evening and fetch 
 hot water for the Sixth Form. As the night work 
 is thought to be easiest it is usually given to the 
 boys in the Upper Eemoves. In some houses the 
 fagging duties are lighter than in others, but whether 
 they be light or heavy the boys never rebel against 
 tliem." 
 
 Play-time at Harrow is given over to cricket, foot- 
 ball, and racquets— the Harrovians excelling all com- 
 
24-i SciiooL-BoY Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 petitors in the latter. Sings Byron, referring to tliese 
 
 liours of relaxation : 
 
 " Yet, when confinement's lingering hour was done, 
 
 Our sports, our studies, and our souls were one ! 
 
 Together we nnpelled the flying ball, 
 
 Together joined in cricket's manly toil, 
 
 Or shared the produce of the river's spoil ; 
 
 Or, plunging from the green declining shore, 
 
 Our pliant limbs the buoyant water bore; 
 
 In every element unchanged, the same — 
 
 All, all that broihers should be but the name! " 
 
 In tlie calendar of British sport two events attract 
 general attention, both being connected with institu- 
 tions of learning. The first is the Oxford and Cam- 
 bridge boat-race over the Thames course ; the second 
 is the Eton and Harrow cricket-match at Lord's. The 
 lirst, in early spring, may be said to open the London 
 season ; the last, in the late summer, closes the round 
 of fashionable gayety, and Harrovians and Etonians 
 emulate in cricket the athletic aquatic prowess of 
 Cantabrians and Oxonians on the bosom of Father 
 Thame. Many instances might be cited to prove 
 that some of the most distinguished public men in the 
 last century of English history were enthusiastic 
 athletes in their school-boy and college days. 
 
 The Eton and Harrow match at Lord's is worth 
 seeing and describing. Lord's ground is situated in 
 
Harrow School. 245 
 
 the fashionable suburban district known as St. Jolm's 
 Wood, adjoining the Clergy Orphan School, and the 
 elite and those who love sport for sport's sake attend 
 in crowds. Drags and coaches from Belgravia and 
 Mayfair belt the grounds in solid tiers ; private car- 
 riages and hansoms are numbered by hundreds ; while 
 the comfoi-table middle classes stand on the ground 
 against the ropes. If the day be fine the roofs of the 
 drags and coaches afford dazzling visions of female 
 loveliness and aristocratic grace, and during the in- 
 terval for lunch sumptuous repasts are spread by 
 liveried servants. Royalty is generally present on 
 one or both days. The niceties of the game are 
 watched with scrupulous attention, and enthusiastic 
 applause greets every bit of fine play. 
 
 The sight is interesting and picturesque; the ladies are in 
 their lightest and prettiest costumes ; the gentlemen have gen- 
 erally discarded black cloth; the liveries of the servants are 
 bright with many buttons; the silver mountings of coach and 
 carriage flash in the sun ; the two blues of the rival schools 
 flutter agdnst the lighter blue of the sky; inside the barricade 
 of carriages thousands of persons are promenading; the grand 
 stands are alive with people coming and going; and then pres- 
 ently the ground is once more cleared for action, every body 
 gets back to his or her place of observation, and your eye rests 
 upon a green expanse, like an enormous billiard-table, dotted 
 with white-flanneled cricketers. Outside Lord's there is a 
 
Sic School- Boy Life in Mj^kkie England. 
 
 continual stream of traffic to and fro, coming and going from 
 Loudon ; it is regulated by a double line of policemen, who 
 stretch away as far as Baker Street; and in many of the villas 
 round about the grounds private luncheons are spread for 
 friends and visitors. 
 
 Two or three peculiarities of dress distinguish Har- 
 rovians. The boys in the Lower School all wear tlic 
 short, round jacket ; but when they rise into the Up- 
 per School they wear tailed coats, familiarly spoken 
 of as "tails." The entire school wear straw hats, 
 winter and summer, known as "straws." These 
 " straws " have a band of either blue or black ribbon 
 around the crown, and a slender round elastic, such 
 as girls and women use, depends from the inner edge 
 of the brim and is caught in the hair at tlie back of 
 the head ! No one knows w^hy the chin elastic should 
 be so worn ; but the boys " have always done so," 
 and that is enough sanction for the fashion in their 
 eyes. On Sundays "straws" are laid aside for tall 
 silk " chimney-pot " hats. Oddly enough, the " tails" 
 of the older boys are cut like a modern dress-coat, 
 or claw-hammer, and the boys wearing any color of 
 vests and trowsers they choose the hybrid effect can 
 be better imagined than described. 
 
 The cricket Eleven, the deities of the school, wor- 
 shiped by the younger boys and honestly admired 
 
Harrow School. 24*1 
 
 by tlie Upper School, are privileged to wear black- 
 and-white "straws," white flannel trowsers, white 
 vests, and brass buttons on their coats. Being elected 
 to the eleven is in school slang called ''getting your 
 flannels." No one but the members of the Eleven 
 may wear white vests ; and when a boy has, on ac- 
 count of his superior prowess in the cricket-fleld, 
 been chosen as one of the Eleven, he is cheered by 
 the entire school on assembling for the next ensu- 
 ing "bill." Another peculiarity is the habit Har- 
 rovians have of clipping the names of things or 
 observances connected with the school, and aflixing 
 the syllable er to the contraction. Thus, foot-ball 
 becomes Footer; the duck-pond where they swim 
 {q Duclcer ; the Speech-Room i^Speecher; the Sick- 
 Room Sicker^ etc. A Harrow boy's conversation is 
 so interlarded with these strange words as to be almost 
 unintelligible to the uninitiated. 
 
 There is an unwritten law that all fights must 
 come off in presence of the entire school. A small 
 grassy space under the school-house wall is shown as 
 the "milling-ground." In presence of so democratic 
 an audience no fight can take place except for good 
 cause, and any thing like gouging, unfair hitting, or 
 cowardly tactics is impossible. 
 
248 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 Cricket is the fovorite game at Harrow, and the 
 cricket-iield is one of the iinest anywhere. Every 
 holiday sees the fields dotted with players, and school- 
 house matches are frequent. The last match of the 
 year is oddly named the " Goose Match." It comes 
 off in the last week of Ootober, and takes its name 
 from the fact that in the evening both elevens have a 
 grand dinner, at w^hich goose is the chief dish. 
 
 Foot-ball comes after cricket in popularity. Thrice 
 in a fortnight there is a " School Compul.," that is, 
 a compulsory " footer," when the whole school must 
 play save those excused by the doctor. In the match- 
 es between the various "houses" the masters take 
 part, and are as zealous for the honor of their side as 
 the boys. Sometimes the masters challenge the 
 "houses," one at a time, and beat them, too. The 
 Harrow game is not so rough as that at Rugby. 
 Founder's Day, October 9, sees the great "footer" 
 match of the year, in honor of " Yeoman John Lyon, 
 of Preston." On this occasion there is a reunion of 
 old and new Harrovians, a sermon is preached by the 
 head-master, there is a big school dinner, and in the 
 early evening the boys troop into "Speedier" and 
 sing school songs as only Harrow boys can sing. 
 
CHARTERHOUSE SCHOOL. 
 
 Plotto : 
 FLOREAT /ETERNUM CARTHUSIANA DOMUS.' 
 
Charterhouse School. 
 
 LTHOUGH we were scliool fel- 
 lows, my acquaintance with young 
 Newconie at the seat of learning 
 where we first met was very brief 
 and casual. He had the advantage 
 of being six years the junior of liis present 
 biographer, and such a difference of age be- 
 tween lads at a public school puts intimacy 
 out of the question, a junior ensign being no 
 more familiar with the commander-in-chief at the 
 Horse-Guards, or a barrister on his first circuit with 
 'my lord -chief-justice on the bench, than the newly- 
 breeched inflmt in the Petties with the senior boy in 
 a tailed coat. As we ' knew each other at home,' as 
 our school phrase was, and our families were some- 
 what acquainted, Newcome's maternal uncle, when he 
 brought the child after the Christmas vacation .to the 
 Grey Friars' School, recommended him in a neat 
 
252 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 complimentary speech to my siiperiiiteiideiice and 
 protection. I promised to do wliat I could for the 
 boy, and he proceeded to take leave of his little 
 nephew in my presence in terms equally eloquent, 
 pulling out a long and very slender green purse, from 
 which he extracted the sum of two-and-sixpence, 
 which he presented to the child, who received tlie 
 money with rather a queer twinkle in his blue eyes. 
 
 " After that day's school I met my little protege 
 in the neighborhood of a pastry-cook's regaling him- 
 self with raspberry tarts. ' You must not spend all 
 that money, sir, which your uncle gave,' said I (hav- 
 ing pei'haps even at that early age a slightly satirical 
 turn), * in tarts and ginger-beer. ' 
 
 " The urchin rubbed the raspberry jam off liis 
 mouth, and said, ' It don't matter, sir, for I've got 
 lots more.' 
 
 " ' How much ? ' says the Grand Inquisitor, for the 
 formula of interrogation used to be, when a new boy 
 came to the school. What's your name ? Who's your 
 father ? and. How much money have you got ? 
 
 " The little fellow pulled such a handful of sove- 
 reigns out of his pocket as might have made the tall- 
 est scholar feel a pang of envy. ' Uncle Hobson,' 
 says lie, ' gave me two ; Aunt Ilobson gave me one — 
 
Charteehouse School. 253 
 
 no, Aunt Hobson gave me thirty sliillings. Uncle 
 lN"ewcome gave me three pound ; and Aunt Ann 
 gave me one-pound-tive ; and Aunt Iloneyman sent 
 me ten shillings in a letter ; and Ethel wanted to give 
 me a pound, only I wouldn't have it, you know, be- 
 cause Ethel's younger than me, and I have plenty.' 
 
 " ' And who is Ethel ? ' asks the senior boy, smiling 
 at the artless youth's confessions. 
 
 " ' Ethel is my cousin,' replies little ]S"ewcome — 
 'Aunt Ann's daughter. There's Ethel, and Alice, 
 and Aunt Ann wanted the baby to be called Boadicea, 
 only uncle wouldn't ; and there's Barnes, and Egbert, 
 and little Alfred, only he don't count — he's quite a 
 baby, you know. Egbert and me was at school at 
 Timpany's. He's going to Eton next half. He's 
 older than me, but I can lick him.' 
 
 " ' And how old is Egbert ? ' asked the smiling 
 senior. 
 
 '' ' Egbert's ten, and I'm nine, and Ethel's seven,' 
 replies the little chubby-faced hero, digging his hands 
 deep into his trowsers' pockets, and jingling all the 
 sovereigns there. I advised him to let me be his 
 banker, and, keeping one out of his many gold pieces, 
 he handed over the others, on which he drew with 
 great liberality till his whole stock was expended. 
 
254 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 The scliool-lionrs of the upper and under boys were 
 different, the little fellows coming out of their hall 
 lialf an hour before the Fifth and Sixth Forms ; and 
 many a time I used to find my little blue-jacket in 
 waiting, with his honest, square face and white hair 
 and bright blue eyes, and I knew that he was come to 
 draw on his bank. Erelong one of the pretty blue 
 eyes was shut up, and a fine black one substituted in 
 its place. He had been engaged, it appeared, in a 
 pugilistic encounter with a giant of his own Form, 
 whom he had worsted in the combat. ' Didn't I 
 pitch into him, that's all,' says he, in the elation of 
 victory, and when I asked whence the quarrel arose 
 lie stoutly informed me that Wolf Minor, his oppo- 
 nent, had been bullying a little boy, and that he, the 
 gigantic Kewcome, wouldn't stand it ! " 
 
 The foregoing extract, so redolent of the atmos- 
 phere of an English public school half a century 
 ago, is from one of the chapters of The Newcomes, a 
 work thought by many to be Thackeray's master- 
 piece, in which the liero is educated and afterward 
 dies in the old Charterhouse in London. 
 
 The metropolis of Great Britain boasts of five of 
 the ten famous foundations known in England as 
 
Chakteeiiouse School. 255 
 
 Public Schools — Cliarterlionse School, Christ Hos- 
 pital, St. Paul's School, Merchant Taylors' School, 
 and Westminster School. The first enjoys the dis- 
 tinction of being the oldest group of buildings in 
 London, save the historic Tower ; the second is better 
 known as " the Blue-coat School," while tlie last 
 nestles under the shadow of the great ^Norman abbey 
 on the banks of Thame. 
 
 Not far from Christ Hospital — in fact, l)nt for 
 the city's ceaseless roar and rattle, the boys at play 
 might answer each others wild halloos — stands tlie 
 Charterhouse, the historic Aid ersgate Street, anciently 
 Alderman's Gate Street, forming the connecting ar- 
 tery between the two schools. 
 
 Like the twin titles of the Newgate Street School, 
 the name Charterhouse needs some explanation. The 
 word is a coi'ruption of La Chartreuse, the place near 
 Grenoble, in France, where St. Bruno, in 1086, 
 founded a monastic order famed for its piety and 
 austere rule. In 1170 the order received the ap- 
 proval of the reigning pope and spread rapidly over 
 Europe, dating from 1180 in England, whore the 
 monasteries were called " Chartreuse Houses," which 
 in time became in common speech corrupted into 
 "Charterhouses" — a not surprising transmutation 
 
256 School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 when we remember how much the English of the 
 twelfth century were exercised about " the great 
 charter." 
 
 The rules of the Carthusian order, says Basil 
 Cliampney, " were founded on those of the Benedic- 
 tines, and were exceedingly strict. Solitude and si- 
 lence were enjoined. The brothers dined in common 
 on rare occasions only, and usually met together in 
 their chapel solely. So strict w^as the rule that they 
 were excluded by elaborate devices from communica- 
 tion even with the lay brethren who attended to their 
 wants. The monks wore hair shirts ; generally ab- 
 stained from meat; on Fridays took nothing but 
 bread and water; supported themselves by manual 
 labor; never left the monastery, and allowed no 
 women within the precincts." Such was the austerity 
 of the life practiced in the cloisters, where later the 
 shouts of careless boyhood awoke merry echoes. 
 
 The history of the Charterhouse naturally falls 
 into three periods. 
 
 The first epoch starts at the beginning of the his- 
 tory of the group of buildings known to this day 
 by the collective name " Cliarterhouse." " When, in 
 the middle of the fourteenth century, a plague broke 
 out in England, a Flemish nobleman named Sir 
 
Charterhouse School. 257 
 
 "Walter de Manny,* greatly distressed by the mise- 
 ries consequent thereon, formed a design of alleviat- 
 ing as far as might be the suffering it caused among 
 the poor. With the view of rendering such aid as 
 lay in his power in this terrible emergency, he pur- 
 chased some thirteen acres of land known as the 
 Spittle (Hospital) Croft. The land thus acquired 
 joined a plot of three acres known anciently as No- 
 Man's Land, -which had been purchased for a burial 
 ground by the then Bishop of London, who had also 
 erected thereon a chapel in which might be said 
 masses for the dead. De Manny had originally in- 
 tended his thirteen acres for an extension of the 
 burial ground, and iifty thousand bodies are said to 
 have been interred there. Bat a few years later he 
 altered his plans, and in 1371 planned and built the 
 buildings for a Carthusian monastery. The extent 
 
 '^ This gentleman escorted Pliilippa of Haiiiault to England for 
 her marriage with King Edward Third. His residence at tlie En- 
 glish court was prolonged some years, and in the fifth year of his 
 majesty's reign he received the honor of knighthood, Tims attached 
 to the court of England, he became a faithful adherent of Edward. 
 After having done valiant service in tlie French wars, during which 
 he was taken prisoner, he was, on his return to England, made a 
 peer of the realm, and a knight of the Order of the Garter. He 
 was a man of deep religious feeling, and devoted much of his life 
 to the furtherance of good works. — William Haig Brown. 
 
 17 
 
25S SonooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 of De Manny's buildings is clearly marked by a plan 
 preserved to this day in the master's lodge. Save 
 some outlying buildings, a gateway, a wind-mill, and 
 the ' flesh-kitchen,' known also as ' Egypt,' — a name 
 wliich indicates the austerity of the Cartliusian's life 
 — they formed a complete and extensive quadrangu- 
 lar inclosure, the whole being surrounded by a cov- 
 ered cloister," running round the four sides of what 
 is so well known to old Carthusians as " Upper 
 Green." Here were the twenty-four cottages, or 
 cells, in which the same number of monks lived a si- 
 lent, solitary life, almost after the manner of hermits. 
 On the south side w^ere the Chapel and Chapter-house. 
 The latter has entirely disappeared. Of the twenty- 
 four cells nothing remains but a couple of door-ways ; 
 the original chapel is still represented by a part of 
 the south wall and a few^ buttresses. The little clois- 
 ter, where the guests were lodged, and a small quad- 
 rangle, in which dwelt the servants of the monks, 
 still remain. They were built about 1500, and the 
 whole of the main walls are well preserved. 
 
 The south side, says Mr. Champney, "included 
 the present south aisle of the chapel, and the western 
 wall of the eastern cells is now the eastern boundary 
 of the premises. In the old stone wall was long dis- 
 
Charterhouse School. 259 
 
 cernible the opening through which food was passed 
 to the occupant of one of the cells. The number of 
 the cells, twenty-four in all, is a larger unniber than 
 is usually found in a Carthusian monastery, the regu- 
 lation number being thirteen. The original main 
 gateway stood in the position of that which now 
 stands fronting on Charterhouse Square. The an- 
 cient plan before alluded to shows a very elaborate 
 system of water supply. The central feature of the 
 *quad' is a sort of conduit house, now called the 
 ' wash-house,' octagonal in form, some iifty feet in 
 diameter, and a hundred in height. From it there 
 issue four streams toward the cardinal points, which 
 affain communicate with water - courses runnino; 
 behind the cells, and probably used for sanitary pur- 
 poses." 
 
 Space will not permit a detailed description of the 
 many curious and noble chambers in old Charter- 
 house. But we may find room for a brief sketch of 
 the beauties of the most remarkable of these, known 
 as the governor's room, so called " because for many 
 years after the foundation of the hospital the assem- 
 blies of the governors were held there. The ceiling 
 is highly ornamented with geometric figures, heraldic 
 lions and shields emblazoned with coats of arms of 
 
260 School-Boy Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 several members of the Howard family. These 
 were for many years covered with whitewash, but 
 their colors have recently been restored, and the 
 ceiling ranks among the best specimens of that kind 
 of work. In the border the well-known motto of 
 the Duke, Sola virtus invicta, in gold letters, occurs 
 several times. On the walls are some ancient tapes- 
 tries, one of which is said to represent the siege of 
 Calais. Originally tliey served as an arras, but they 
 fell into partial decay ; the main parts, however, are 
 still preserved, and these have been carefully put to- 
 gether, and now serve as wall decorations in large 
 panels." 
 
 The nucleus of this extensive establishment was, as 
 we have seen, the plot called "No-Man's Land." 
 This is now the area of Charterhouse S(piare, and the 
 governors keep their rights intact by receiving from 
 each occupier of a house opening into the square a 
 nominal rent for the privilege of leaving his house 
 by the front door ! In the days of King James First 
 several noble mansions, notably those of Lord Rut- 
 land, Lord Dorset, and Lord Tankerville, occupied 
 adjoining sites. 
 
 The second stage in the history of the place began 
 in 1537, when, in common with many another of the 
 
Chaetekhouse School. 261 
 
 English monasteries, Cliarterliouse was " visited " by 
 Henry Eighth, and its downfall set. The monks who 
 remained faithful to their religion were treated with 
 severity exceptional even under the hands of " that 
 spot of blood and grease on the page of history " — 
 Bluff King Hal. Houghton the Prior was hanged 
 at his own gateway for denying and ridiculing the 
 king's supremacy in matters spiritual ; his monks 
 met either the same fate or a worse one in being sent 
 to a prisoner's lingering death in a dungeon's depths. 
 Having confiscated the property of the brotherhood 
 the king about eight years afterward made a grant of 
 it to Sir Edward, later Lord North. 
 
 He at once, says a recent writer, "proceeded to 
 turn it into a residence for himself. The Gi*eat 
 Cloister, with its twenty-four little stone cottages, 
 was of no use to help him, except, perhaps, to furnish 
 building materials. But the Little Cloister, with its 
 stately Guesten Hall, and spacious suite of rooms on 
 the first and second floors, was a mansion ready made. 
 This part of the building he seems scarcely to have 
 touched, and fortunately the little quadrangle, where 
 the servants of the monks lived, was also spared, as 
 being equally convenient for those of the nobleman. 
 In 1565 Eoger, Lord North, son of Edward, sold the 
 
262 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 property for £2,500 to the Duke of Norfolk, wlio 
 spent no little time and money in beautifying, and 
 perhaps slightly adding to, the house which he had 
 bought. It is to him we probably owe the great 
 staircase, the Music Gallery^ and side gallery in the 
 Great Hall, the Governor's Koom, built on the north 
 side of the hall — probably upon the site of the prior's 
 lodgings — and the brick cloister, dear to the hearts of 
 Carthusian foot-ball players, which occupies the site 
 of the western side of the Great Cloister of the mon- 
 astery. "We must not omit to mention that during 
 Lord North's tenure of the property it passed for a 
 short time, either by sale or gift, into the possession 
 of the Duke of Northumberland. Lord North, how- 
 ever, soon got it back again, for not many months 
 passed before the Duke of Northumberland was be- 
 lieaded (1553), when the property was forfeited to 
 the Crown, and immediately re-granted to Lord 
 North. Dukes, indeed, w^ere unlucky owners of the 
 Charterhouse, for another duke — namely, the Duke 
 of Norfolk, already mentioned — possessed it for a 
 few years, and he also perished on the scaffold. 
 Thus in less than twenty years it was the property 
 of two dukes, both of whom were beheaded for In'gh 
 treason." 
 
Charterhouse School. 263 
 
 The foregoing brief sketch covers the period be- 
 tween 1537, wlien the monastery was dissolved, and 
 1611, when Thomas Sutton purchased the premises, 
 still containing thirteen acres of land, and the build- 
 ings thereon, and proceeded to convert them to the 
 uses of a beneficent charitj^, the purchaser pajang 
 £13,000 for the property, and,furtlier,devoted nearly 
 the whole of a large fortune to the establishment of 
 a home or " hospital " for aged men and a school for 
 boys. 
 
 King James First issued letters-patent decreeing 
 tliat it should be called '' the Hospital of King James 
 founded in the Charterliouse." On tlie foundation 
 were eiglity poor brothers and forty-four poor schol- 
 ars. But these limits have been exceeded for many 
 years, as the Charterhouse grew more and more 
 wealthy, until now there are five hundred boys, of 
 whom sixty are "scholars." But owing to a recent 
 decrease of income from agricultural lands it has 
 been found necessary to reduce the number of pen- 
 sioners temporarily, and there are now only fifty-five 
 housed in tlie old buildings. 
 
 According to Sutton's plan, education was to be 
 given free of cost, and gratuitous support to the 
 "eighty ancient gentlemen, captains, and others. 
 
26tl: SciiooL-BoY Life in Merkie England. 
 
 brought to distress by shipwreck, wounds, and other 
 reverses of fortune," and tlie establishment w^as lib- 
 erally endowed by the worthy burgess. He died in 
 1611, just after completing his plans. The property 
 w^liich passed into the hands of Sutton consisted of 
 the before-mentioned thirteen acres of land, on which 
 stood the chapel of the monastery, the banqueting 
 hall of the Duke of [N'orfolk, and his reception rooms, 
 a large part of the structure which is now the Mas- 
 ter's Lodge, Washhouse Court, and all that remained 
 of the monastic buildings. 
 
 Very little can be said of the ancestry of Thomas 
 Sutton. He was born at Knarth, in Lincolnshire, in 
 1532, His father, though not a person of high dis- 
 tinction, was of some standing in the city of Lincoln, 
 where he filled the post of steward to the courts. 
 In early youth the father sent his son to Eton, and 
 from thence lie is said to have passed to St. John's 
 College, Cambridge, where he was matriculated Nov. 
 27, 1551. He became a student of Lincoln's Inn, but 
 the study of law was soon exchanged for the diver- 
 sion of foreign travel through Holland, France, Italy, 
 and Spain. By his father's will Sutton was provided 
 with such a competence that he was able to dispose 
 of his time according to his own inclination, and 
 
Charterhouse School. 2t35 
 
 consequently he attached himself to the retinue of 
 Tliomas, Duke of Norfolk. After some time spent 
 in this service he became secretary to the Earl of 
 Warwick, and was by this nobleman granted a retir- 
 ing pension in 1569. 
 
 The earl being Master-general of Ordnance, he 
 appointed Sutton to be his subordinate at Berwick, 
 and out of this important post grew some active 
 service against the rebels in the north of Britain 
 from 1569-1573. On the restoration of order 
 Sutton turned his attention to mercantile affairs. 
 " During his service he had been impressed by the 
 undeveloped mineral wealth which lay buried in the 
 coal-mines of Northumberland, and he secured a 
 lease of some land for a period of seventy-nine 
 years. He did not return to London until 15S0, 
 and then he brought with him two horseloads of 
 money, and was said to be worth £50,000. It was 
 said that he was richer in ready money than Queen 
 Elizabeth herself." 
 
 When Thomas Sutton passed away from this world 
 he left behind him a princely fortune, and he tried 
 in bequeathing it, as he had in using it in his life- 
 time, to promote, as far as in him lay, the greatest 
 good to the greatest number, regarding himself only 
 
2GG SciiooL-BoY Life in Mkkrie England. 
 
 as the steward and dispenser of the wealth tliat had 
 been intrusted to his care.* 
 
 Fortunately Sutton's trustees and the governors 
 upon whom fell the duty of settling up the twin 
 charities did not find it necessary to interfere to any 
 large extent with the interestins: buildinojs on the site. 
 Alterations had to be made in the chapel, wdiich was 
 now called upon tc hold a far larger number tlian 
 the twenty-four monks for whom it was originally 
 built, and as a consequence w^e have now a building 
 in the Jacobean style of architecture, dating from 
 1612, of which the ante-chapel, the south wall, two 
 windows and a door-way, w^ith part of the east wall, 
 alone date from the days of the monks. But the rest 
 of the buildings remained much as they were, and, 
 thanks to the conserving hand of a long series of 
 governors and masters, they have come dowm little 
 changed to our owm day. 
 
 At the northern end of the cloister, near where 
 the Duke of Norfolk ha ' built his tennis court, Sut- 
 ton put up the school-houses for the lodgment of tlie 
 poor children for wdiose education he provided. 
 
 * For the facts in the foregoing biograpliy of Thomas Sutton the 
 writer is indebted to the admirable historj- of tlie Charterhouse by 
 Wilham Haiof Brown, long head-master of tlie school. 
 
Charterhouse School. 267 
 
 These were standing until the transfer of the school 
 to Godahning, when they were destroyed to make 
 way for a new buikling for Merchant Taylors' 
 School. At the same time a large portion of the 
 characteristic old cloister disappeared. Tlie school 
 buildings were modest, sober, and dignified in char- 
 acter, and a fair example of the more utilitarian brick 
 architecture of the period. 
 
 The Public Schools Act of 1868, to which refer- 
 ence has been made, affected the old Charterhouse 
 not a little. In September, 1872, the old site was 
 abandoned, so far as the school for boys was con- 
 cerned, and the latter was transferred to new build- 
 ings at Godalming in Surrey. The old buildings 
 were transferred, after some vandal reconstruction, to 
 the Merchant Taylors' School, as above alluded to, 
 and were opened by the Prince of Wales on April 6, 
 1875, so that boys still learn in Sutton's hospital and 
 gambol in the monks' great cloister. At the same 
 time the buildings for the "poor brethren" were 
 modified and modernized, and both the old and young 
 beneficiaries profited by the change. 
 
 There are, of course, many ancient and honored 
 observances connected with so venerable an institu- 
 tion. What is known as " Founder's Day " has been 
 
268 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 maiiitained without a single omission for over two 
 lumdred years. "Every year, on the anniversary of 
 the death of Thomas Sutton, they who have partaken 
 of his bounty liave together blessed his memory. 
 Very early after the foundation of Charterhouse those 
 who had been educated within its walls chose this 
 day for their meeting, and tlie dinner of Old Car- 
 thusians on the 12th of December is probably the 
 most ancient of similar celebrations anywhere." 
 
 As elsewhere noted, Thackeray was a pupil at 
 Charterhouse, and in The Newcomes he has left us 
 some pleasing pen-pictures and glimpses of its life 
 and doings. Here is his account of Founder's Day : 
 
 " Mention has been made once or twice in the 
 course of this history of the Grey Friars' School — 
 where the colonel and Clive and I had been brought 
 up — an ancient foundation of tlie time of James 
 First, still subsisting in the heart of London city. 
 The death-day of the founder of the place is still 
 kept solemnly by Cistercians. In their chapel, where 
 assemble the boys of the school, and the fourscore 
 old men of the Hospital, the founder's tomb stands — 
 a huge edifice emblazoned with heraldic decorations 
 and clumsy carved allegories. There is an old hall, 
 a beautiful specimen of the architecture of James's 
 
Charterhouse School. 209 
 
 time ; an old liall ? — many old halls ; old staircases, 
 old passages, old cliambers decorated with old portraits, 
 walking in the midst of which we walk as it were in 
 the early seventeenth century. To others than Cister- 
 cians Grey Friars is a dreary place, possibly. jN'ever- 
 theless, the pupils educated there love to revisit it ; 
 and the oldest of us grow young again for an hour 
 or two as we come back into those scenes of child- 
 hood. The custom of the school is that on the 
 twelfth of December, the Founder's Day, the head 
 gown-boy shall recite a Latin oration in praise Fun- 
 datoris nostri and upon other subjects ; and a goodly 
 company of old Cistercians is generally brought to- 
 gether to attend this oration : after which we go to 
 chapel and hear a sermon ; after which we adjourn 
 to a great dinner where old condisciples meet, old 
 toasts are given, and speeches are made. Before 
 marching from the oration hall to chapel the stewards 
 of the day's dinner, according to old-fashioned rite, 
 have wands put into their hands, walk to church at 
 the head of the procession, and sit there in places of 
 honor. The boys are already in their seats with 
 sunny, fresh faces and shiny white collars ; the old 
 black-gowned pensioners are on their benches ; the 
 chapel is lighted, and founder's tomb, with its gro- 
 
270 SciiooL-BoY Life in Mekeie England. 
 
 tesqne carvings, uioiisters, heraldries, darkles and 
 shines with the most wonderful shadows and li<j;'lits. 
 There he lies, Fundator nostei\ in his ruff and gown, 
 awaiting the great examination day. We oldsters, be 
 we never so old, become boys again as we look at 
 that familiar old tomb, and think how the seats are 
 altered since we were here, and how the doctor — 
 not the present doctor, the doctor of our time — used 
 to sit yonder, and his awful eye used to frighten us 
 shuddering boys on whom it lighted ; and how the 
 boy next us would kick our shins during service 
 time, and how the monitor would cane us afterward 
 because our shins were kicked. Yonder sit forty 
 cherry-cheeked bo3^s thinking about home and holi- 
 days to-morrow. Yonder sit some tlireescore old 
 gentlemen pensioners of the hospital, listening to the 
 prayers and the psalms. You hear them coughing 
 feebly in the twilight — the old reverend black-gowns. 
 Is Codd Ajax alive? you wonder. The Cistercian 
 boys called these old gentlemen Codds — I know not 
 wherefore — but is Codd Ajax alive, I wonder; or 
 Codd Soldier or kind old Codd Gentleman ; or has 
 tlie grave closed over them? A plenty of candles 
 lighted up this chapel, and this scene of age and 
 youth and early memories and pompous death. How 
 
ClIAKTEEHOUSE ScHOOL. 271 
 
 solemn tlie well-remembered prayers are, here uttered 
 again in tlie place where in childhood we nsed to 
 hear them ! How beautiful and decorous the rite; 
 how noble the ancient words of the supplications 
 which the priest utters and to which generations of 
 fresh children and troops of bygone seniors have cried 
 Amen nnder those arches ! " 
 
 Still another occasion, says Mr. William Haig 
 Brown, author of Charterhouse Past and Present^ 
 which draws together the members of the school is 
 the annual cricket match between old and young 
 Carthusians. It was first observed in 1833, so can 
 already boast of a respectable antiquity. Then there 
 is the Concert, which is given annually, and which 
 was instituted in 1846 by Mr. John Hullah, the dis- 
 tinguished composer, who was then, and for many 
 succeeding years, teacher of singing to the school. 
 An important feature of the concert is the closing 
 hymn, in which all present join heartily, known as 
 " The Carmen," and the rnusic to which was written 
 by Mr. Horsley, who from 1837-58 was organist of 
 Chartei'house. 
 
 Charterhouse occupies famous ground. As we 
 have seen, the site was for centuries devoted to 
 ecclesiastical uses. The buildings occupy an irregu- 
 
272 SciiooL-BoY Life i^ Mekkie EngLxVnd. 
 
 lar plot of ground in what is now Clerkenwell, 
 bounded by St. John Street Road, Aldersgate Street, 
 Wilderness Row, and Charterhouse Square, the main 
 gate opening on the latter. Within a stone's throw- 
 is Sinithfield, scene of unnumbered burnings, whip- 
 pings, and scourgings in the times of religious perse- 
 cutions in England, whence the cant or slang name 
 of " Smiffle," which Carthusians often use in refer- 
 ring to their beloved school. Also near by was the 
 old priory of St. John, occupied by the Knights 
 Templar, who removed therefrom to the Temple. 
 The whole district is now densely populated by an 
 artisan class, and Clerkenwell has been long famed 
 for its watch-making. 
 
 By the enormous rise in values of house property 
 Charterhouse has waxed opulent, and is now one of 
 the wealthiest benevolent corporations in the wealthy 
 city of London. On that part of the property front- 
 ing on Aldersgate Street a large block of warehouses 
 was erected some years ago, which alone yield a hand- 
 some revenue. On the night of October 8, 1885, a 
 fire, involving a loss of $5,000,000, consumed thir- 
 teen of these warehouses and their contents, besides 
 damaging sliglitly the Merchant Taylors' School. 
 
 Historical memories cluster around the venerable 
 
Charterhouse School. 273 
 
 pile in Charterhouse Square. Here Prior Houghton 
 entertained Sir Thomas More and Dean Colet. 
 Queen Elizabeth visited and was royally welcomed 
 by Lord North, its first lay owner, and her successor, 
 James First, slept, for the first time in the metropolis, 
 under its roof when he came southward by the great 
 North Road to claim his throne. ^' In the Governor's 
 Room Elizabeth and James First held court — indeed, 
 almost all the illustrious characters of England, and 
 not a few of the great men of foreign countries, 
 from the days of Henry Eighth down to the death of 
 Charles First, were acquainted with it ; some of them 
 as inhabitants of the mansion, some as attendants on 
 Queen Elizabeth or James First, some as visitors and 
 guests of the noble owners of the mansion, some as 
 governors of Sutton's charity. After the triumph 
 of the Cromwellians all the leading men of that party 
 attended meetings in it, and since the restoration the 
 governors have always been men of eminence in 
 Church and State." 
 
 As is the case with all of the sister schools, 
 many of the greatest men of modern England have 
 been educated there. Here are a few notable names : 
 Thirl wall ; Grote, the great historian of Greece ; 
 
 Lord-Chief-Justice Ellenborough ; Lord Liverj)ool, 
 
 18 
 
274 SciiooL-J3oY Life in Mekkie England. 
 
 sometime j)i*iiiie minister of Eiigland ; Sir Henry 
 Havelock, the gallant soldier of the Indian Mutiny ; 
 Sir C. L. Eastlake, P.K.A., whose paintings are 
 known throughout the world ; Sir William Black- 
 stone, the illustrious commentator on the common 
 law ; Isaac Barrow ; Joseph Addison, and his friend 
 and co-laborer on The Spectator, Sir Richard Steele, 
 and John Wesley."^ 
 
 On August 8, 1757, Wesley revisited the scenes of 
 his boyish life, and comments thereon in his journal: 
 " I wondered that all the squares and buildings, and 
 especially the school-boys, looked so little. I was lit- 
 tle myself when I was at school, and measured all 
 about me by myself." In the Charterhouse he laid 
 the foundation of his great learning and extensive 
 acquirements. 
 
 Wesley^s father owed the privilege of admission to 
 Charterhouse for his son to the Duke of Bucking- 
 ham. The boy seems to have had a hard time ; the 
 elder boys took by force the meat given to the 
 
 * " It is a curious coincidence that in the year 1397 there was 
 founded at Epworth, in Leicestershire, bj' the Earl of Nottingham, a 
 Carthusian monastery, the seventh in the kingdom. At Epworth 
 John Wesley was born in later times, and was sent all the way to 
 London to attend school at the only place in the realm where the 
 name and fame of the ancient order survived." 
 
Charterhouse School. 275 
 
 younger, and for tlie five years he was there the 
 greater part of the time the only solid food he got 
 was bread. Wliile there, says Tyerinan, he "lost the 
 reliarion which had marked his character from the 
 days of infancy ; " but it does not follow that the 
 school was a particularly godless place. In later life 
 Wesley attributed his robust health to the fact that 
 he always obeyed his father's strict command to run 
 round the Charterhouse play-ground three times every 
 morning. 
 
 Thackeray was educated at Charterhouse — not, in- 
 deed, as one of Sutton's poor scholars, for he was not 
 a "gown boy," but as their companion in the school. 
 Here, too, in his powerful novel, The Newcomes^ it 
 will be remembered, we find old Colonel Newcome 
 seeking refuge during the last years of his life as one 
 of tlie eighty poor brothers for whom the founder's 
 bounty provided. 
 
 The list of pensioners includes many names that at 
 one time or another filled men's mouths. The feat- 
 ures of Thackeray's Colonel Newcome were said to 
 have been a study from life of one old Charterhouse 
 "poor gentleman." Elkanah Settle, Dryden's rival, 
 died within the precincts of Charterhouse in 1724 ; 
 Stephen Gray, the noted scientist, was a pensioner ; 
 
276 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merkie England. 
 
 so was Zacliariali Williams, the naturalist. Indeed, 
 the army, the Church, the bench, the bar, and medi- 
 cine have supplied many a recipient of Sutton's 
 bounty. 
 
 But we must now take up the third and last period 
 of the annals of Charterhouse — the removal of the 
 school to Godalming, in Surrey. The following re- 
 sume of the reasons for this radical step are presented 
 by Mr. Brown : 
 
 " When Sutton selected Howard House as the best 
 site for his Hospital this liouse was then on the very 
 outskirts of the city. It was surrounded on all sides 
 by open spaces. On the north the village of Isling- 
 ton lay about a mile distant from the walls of Char- 
 terhouse, and the walk between them was through 
 green fields ; farther to the east was the neighboring 
 village of Hackney. On the west the houses of Snow 
 Hill and Newgate Street were not yet built; no 
 buildings were to be seen in the Strand. On the 
 south the left bank of the river was only sparsely oc- 
 cupied by the mansions of peers and wealthy mer- 
 chants. And even for two hundred years after the 
 founder's death Charterhouse School was on the bor- 
 ders of a rural locality. But the condition of things 
 was altogether changed when the site, once so admi- 
 
Chakterhouse School. 277 
 
 rably adapted for its purpose, was closely surrounded 
 by a densely crowded population, when every trace of 
 rural freshness was abolished, and the boys were of 
 necessity closely confined within five acres surrounded 
 by high brick walls and overlooked from the upper 
 stories of Goswell Street and Wilderness Kow. Such 
 a change had come over the neighborhood of the 
 school that even those- who had been educated in it 
 began to withdraw from it. They regarded it, indeed, 
 with that strong attachment which generally binds 
 Englishmen to the schools in which they have been 
 trained, and declared that they would do any thing 
 for it except send their boys to it." 
 
 Thus the school found itself decaying, in spite of 
 all that could be done, and at length the oft-mooted 
 removal became an accomplished fact. 
 
 In 1864 the Public Schools Commissioners stated 
 it as their belief that " the school would thrive much 
 better if removed to some eligible site in the coun- 
 try," and in 1867 Parliament passed an act empower- 
 ing the governors to make the necessary changes, to 
 acquire a new site and erect new buildings thereon, 
 etc. A careful review of seven or eight eligible spots 
 ended by selecting an estate of nearly seventy acres, 
 situate about a mile from the beautiful town of 
 
278 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 Godalming, in the county of Surrey, and thirty-four 
 miles distant from the metropolis. It would have 
 been difficult to choose a better locality. 
 
 "The site of the school is an extensive plateau 
 which commands a view of one of the most lovely 
 panoramas in England. On the north is the long 
 and beautiful ridge known as the Hog's Back ; on the 
 west the noble range of hills which is terminated by 
 Hindhead and Blackdown ; southward are the downs 
 which rise above Hambledon ; and in yet further dis- 
 tance on the east the view is closed by the chain which 
 is marked by St. Martha's Mount and Leith Hill. 
 On all sides except the north the plateau is bounded 
 by wooded slopes of hazel, interspersed with well- 
 grown oak trees. Between the school and the town 
 the river Wey follows its winding course, and adds 
 beauty to the landscape. At the foot of the hill, 
 Godalndng, with its ancient church, the spire rising 
 high above the neighboring roofs, lies amidst an ex- 
 panse of green meads. Beyond it the scene is com- 
 posed of broken hills, rich pastures and extensive 
 woods, and, nestling among these, cottages, farm- 
 steads, and church towers give a human interest to 
 the sight." ^ 
 
 * William ITaig Brown. 
 
Charterhouse School. 279 
 
 Fittingly enough, ground was broken on Founder's 
 Day, December 12, 1869, and on June 18, 1872, the 
 boys met in the new buildings, two years after the 
 first stone had been laid. Many of the historic 
 stones in old Charterhouse, on which were carved the 
 names of boys who had been educated at the school, 
 were removed and built into the new house, and are 
 now arranged in the cloister, at the east end of the 
 chapel. The earliest name placed on these stones 
 was cut in 1778, and there are some as late as 1818. 
 
 Tlie removal worked a very speedy change in the 
 fortunes of Charterhouse, and the increase in attend- 
 ance mounted rapidly from quarter to quarter. In 
 1872 there were but 180 boys enrolled ; by 1876 the 
 attendance had reached the maximum number, 500. 
 
 Charterhouse is especially rich in scholarships, 
 prizes, and exhibitions, there being over a hundred 
 of these, ranging in value from £5 to £80 per an- 
 num, and they are all open to every boy in the school, 
 whether he be a humble free scholar, or the son 
 of wealthy parents who pay liberally for his tuition. 
 
 Boys must be between the ages of eleven and fif- 
 teen to obtain entrance to Charterhouse, and the stat- 
 utes insist that the following subjects shall be taught 
 to all boys in their progress through the school: 
 
280 School-Boy Life in Merrie England. 
 
 Eeligious knowledge, classics, arithmetic, mathemat- 
 ics, natural science, history, geography, English, and 
 either French or German. 
 
 Allusion has been made to the poor brothers of 
 the Charterhouse, and these decayed old gentlemen 
 are not the least interesting feature in its history. 
 As already said, Thackeray's Colonel Newcome was 
 generally believed to have been a sketch from life, 
 and we cannot more fitly close this sketch than by 
 introducing the story of the old pensioner's last 
 days in Sutton's hospital, as portrayed by the master- 
 hand. 
 
 After a boyhood spent in the famous school, and 
 a brave and checkered career in the service of his 
 country, monetary misfortunes overtake him in old 
 age, and he is compelled to crave shelter within the 
 very walls where, as a careless, happy child, he fought, 
 and studied, and played, and where he is discovered 
 by his friend and whilom school-mate, during the 
 celebration of Founder's Day: 
 
 " The service for Founder's Day is a special one. 
 One of the psalms selected being the 37th, and we 
 liear : 
 
 *'23 The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord, and 
 he delighteth in his way. 
 
Chartekpiouse School. 281 
 
 "24 Though he fall he shall not be utterly cast down, for 
 the Lord upholdeth him with his hand, 
 
 " 25 I have been young, and now am old, yet have I not seen 
 the righteous forsaken nor his seed begging bread. 
 
 " As we came to this verse I chanced to look up 
 from my book towards the swarm of black-coated 
 pensioners, and among them sat Thomas Newcome. 
 
 " His dear old head was bent down over his Prayer- 
 Book; there was no mistaking him. He wore the 
 black gown of the pensioners of the Hospital of 
 Greyf riars. His Order of the Bath was on his breast. 
 He stood there among the poor brethren uttering the 
 responses to the psalm. The steps of this good man 
 been ordered hither by Heaven's decree to this alms- 
 house ! Here it was ordained that a life all love and 
 kindness and honor should end ! . . . The organ played 
 us out of chapel at length, and I waited in the ante- 
 chapel until the pensioners took their time to quit it. 
 My dear, dear old friend ! I ran to him w^ith a 
 warmth and eagerness of recognition which no doul)t 
 showed themselves in my face and accents as my 
 iieart was moved at the sight of him. His own wan 
 face flushed up when he saw me, and his hand shook 
 in mine. 'I have found a home, Arthur,' said he. 
 ' Don't you remember, before I went to India, when 
 
282 SciiooL-BoY Life in Merrie England. 
 
 we cume to see tlie old Greyfriars, and visited Cap- 
 tain Scarsdale in liis room ? — a poor brotlier like me — 
 an old Peninsula man. Scarsdale is gone now, sir, 
 and is wdiere the wicked cease from troubling and the 
 weary are at rest. . . . And I thought then when we saw 
 him, here would be a place for an old fellow, when his 
 career was over, to hang his sword up ; to humble his 
 soul, and to wait thankfully for the end, Arthur. 
 My good friend, Lord IL, who is a Cistercian like 
 ourselves, and has just been appointed a Governor, 
 gave me his first nomination. Don't be agitated, 
 Arthur, my boy ; I am very happy. I have good 
 quarters, good food, good light and fire, and good 
 friends ; blessed be God ! My dear, kind young 
 friend — my boy's friend — you have been always so, 
 sir, and I take it uncommonly kind of you, and I thank 
 God for you, sir. Why, sir, I am as happy as the 
 day is long.' He uttered words to this effect as we 
 walked through the courts of the building toward his 
 room, which in truth I found neat and comfortable, 
 with a brisk fire crackling on the hearth, a little 
 tea-table laid out, a Bible and spectacles by the side 
 of it, and over the mantel-piece a drawing of his 
 grandson." 
 
 Bat tlie dear old Colonel's days are drawing to a 
 
Charterhouse School. 283 
 
 close. Sickness intervenes, which proves to be only 
 the beginning of the end : 
 
 "The old man must have passed a sleepless 
 night, for on going to his chamber in the morning 
 his attendant found him dressed in his chair and 
 his bed undisturbed. He must have sat all through 
 the bitter night witliout a fire ; but his hands were 
 burning hot. He spoke of some one coming to 
 drink tea with him, pointed to the fire, and asked 
 why it was not made ? The bell began to ring for 
 morning chapel ; he got up and went toward his 
 gown, groping toward it as though he could hardly 
 see, and put it over his shoulders, and would go 
 out, but he would have fallen in the court if the 
 good nurse had not given him her arm ; and the 
 physician of the hospital passing fortunately at this 
 moment, who had always been a great friend of Col- 
 onel Newcome's, insisted on leading him back to his 
 room again, and got him to bed. *When the bell 
 stopped he wanted to rise once more ; he fancied 
 he was a boy at school again,' said the nurse, ' and 
 that he was going in to Dr. Raine, who was school- 
 master here ever so many years ago.' . . . After 
 some days the fever which liad attacked him left 
 him, but left him so weak and enfeebled that he 
 
284: School-Boy Life in Mekrie England. 
 
 could only go from liis bed to the chair by his fire- 
 side. The season was exceedingly bitter ; the cham- 
 ber which he inhabited was warm and spacious ; it 
 was considered un advisable to move him until he 
 had attained greater strength, and till warmer 
 w^eather. The medical men at the house hoped he 
 might rally in spring. . . . But our colonel, we all 
 were obliged to acknowledge, was no more our friend 
 of old days. lie knew us again, and was good to 
 every one round him, as his wont was, especially 
 when Boy came ; his old eyes lighted up with simple 
 happiness, and with eager, trembling hands he would 
 seek under his bed-clothes or the pockets of his dress- 
 ing-gown for toys, or cakes, which he had caused to 
 be purchased for his grandson. There was a little 
 laughing red-cheeked, white-headed gown-boy of the 
 school to whom the old man had taken a great fancy. 
 One of the symptoms of his returning consciousness 
 and recovery, as we hoped, was his calling for this 
 child, who pleased our friend by his archness and 
 merry ways, and who, to the old gentleman's unfail- 
 ing delight, used to call him Codd Colonel. 'Tell 
 
 little F that Codd Colonel wants to see him,' 
 
 and the little gown-boy was brought to him, and the 
 colonel would listen to him for hours, and hear all 
 
Chakteriiouse School. 285 
 
 about his lessons and his play, and prattle almost as 
 childishly about Dr. Kaine and his own early school- 
 days. The boys of the school, it must be said, had 
 heard the noble old gentleman's touching history, and 
 bad all got to know him and love him. Tliey came 
 every day to hear news of him, sent him in books and 
 papers to amuse him. . . . The days went on, and 
 our hopes, raised sometimes, began to flicker and fail. 
 One evening the colonel left his chair for his bed in 
 pretty good spirits, but passed a disturbed night, 
 and the next morning was too weak to rise. Then 
 he remained in his bed, and his friends visited him 
 there. One afternoon he asked for his little gowm- 
 boy, and the child was brought to him, and sat by 
 the bed wath a very awe-stricken face, and then 
 gathered courage and tried to amuse him by telling 
 him how it was a half-holiday, and they were having 
 a cricket match with the St. Peter's boys on the 
 green, and Greyfriars was 'in' and winning. The 
 colonel quite understood about it — he would like to 
 see the game — he had played many a game on that 
 green when he was a boy. . . . After the child had gone 
 Thomas Newcome began to wander more and more. 
 He talked louder ; he gave the w^ord of command ; 
 spoke Hindustanee, as if to his men. The patient's 
 
280 School-Boy Life m Mekkie England. 
 
 voice sank into faint murmurs; only a moan now 
 and then announced that he was not asleep. At the 
 usual evening hour the chapel bell began to toll, and 
 Thomas Newcome's hands outside the bed feebly 
 beat time. And just as the last bell struck a pe- 
 culiar sweet smile shone over his face, and he lifted 
 up his head a little and quickly said, ' Adsum ! ' and 
 fell back. It was the word we used at school when 
 names were called, and lo, he whose heart was as that 
 of a little child, had answered to his name and stood 
 in the presence of the Master." 
 
 THE END. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
 ill 
 
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