The Lighter Side of School Life Part 2

It is true that when half-a-dozen ribald spirits are gathered round the Lower Study fire after tea, libellous tongues are unloosed. The humorist of the party draws joyous pictures of his Housemaster staggering home to bed after a riotous evening with an Archdeacon, or being thrown out of the Empire in the holidays. But no one in his heart takes these legends seriously--least of all their originator. They are merely audacious irreverences.

All day and every day the boy sees the master, impeccably respectable in cap and gown, rebuking the mildest vices, extolling the dullest virtues, singing the praises of industry and application, and attending Chapel morning and evening. A boy has little or no intuition: he judges almost entirely by externals. To him a master is not as other men are: he is a special type of humanity endowed with a permanent bias towards energetic respectability, and grotesquely ignorant of the seamy side of life. The latter belief in particular appears to be quite ineradicable.

But in truth the scholastic hierarchy is a most complicated fabric. At the summit of the Universe stands the Head. After him come the senior masters--or, as they prefer somewhat invidiously to describe themselves, the permanent staff--then the junior masters. The whole body are divided and subdivided again into little groups--cla.s.sical men, mathematical men, science men, and modern-language men--each group with its own particular axe to grind and its own tender spots. Then follow various specialists, not always resident; men whose life is one long and usually ineffectual struggle to convince the School--including the Head--that music, drawing, and the arts generally are subjects which ought to be taken seriously, even under the British educational system.

As already noted, after the Head--quite literally--come the Housemasters. They are always after him: one or other of the troop is perpetually on his trail; and unless the great man displays the ferocity of the tiger or the wisdom of the serpent, they harry him exceedingly.

Behold him undergoing his daily penance--in audience in his study after breakfast. To him enter severally:

A., a patronising person, with a few helpful suggestions upon the general management of the School. He usually begins: "In the old Head's day, we never, under any circ.u.mstances----"

B., whose speciality is to discover motes in the eyes of other Housemasters. He announces that yesterday afternoon he detected a member of the Eleven fielding in a Panama hat. "Are Panama hats permitted by the statutes of the School? I need hardly say that the boy was not a member of my House."

C., a wobbler, who seeks advice as to whether an infraction of one of the rules of his House can best be met by a hundred lines of Vergil or public expulsion.

D., a Housemaster pure and simple, urging the postponement of the Final House-Match, D.'s best bowler having contracted an ingrowing toe-nail.

E., another, insisting that the date be adhered to--for precisely the same reason.

(He receives no visit from F., who holds that a Housemaster's House is his castle, and would as soon think of coming to the fountain-head for advice as he would of following the advice if it were offered.)

G., an alarmist, who has heard a rumour that smallpox has broken out in the adjacent village, and recommends that the entire school be vaccinated forthwith.

H., a golfer, suggesting a half-holiday, to celebrate some suddenly unearthed anniversary in the annals of Country or School.

Lastly, on the telephone, I., a valetudinarian, to announce that he is suffering from double pneumonia, and will be unable to come into School until after luncheon.

To be quite just, I. is the rarest bird of all. The average schoolmaster has a perfect pa.s.sion for sticking to his work when utterly unfit for it. In this respect he differs materially from his pupil, who lies in bed in the dawning hours, cudgelling his sleepy but fertile brain for a disease which

(1) Has not been used before.

(2) Will incapacitate him for work all morning.

(3) Will not prevent him playing football in the afternoon.

But if a master sprains his ankle, he hobbles about his form-room on a crutch. If he contracts influenza, he swallows a jorum of ammoniated quinine, puts on three waistcoats, and totters into school, where he proceeds to disseminate germs among his not ungrateful charges. Even if he is rendered speechless by tonsillitis, he takes his form as usual, merely subst.i.tuting written invective (chalked up on the blackboard), for the torrent of verbal abuse which he usually employs as a medium of instruction.

It is all part--perhaps an unconscious part--of his permanent pose as an apostle of what is strenuous and praiseworthy. It is also due to a profound conviction that whoever of his colleagues is told off to take his form for him will indubitably undo the work of many years within a few hours.

Besides harrying the head and expostulating with one another, the Housemasters wage unceasing war with the teaching staff.

The bone of contention in every case is a boy, and the combat always follows certain well-defined lines.

A form-master overtakes a Housemaster hurrying to morning chapel, and inquires carelessly:

"By the way, isn't Binks tertius your boy?"

The Housemaster guardedly admits that this is so.

"Well, do you mind if I flog him?"

"Oh, come, I say, isn't that rather drastic? What has he done?"

"Nothing--not a hand's-turn--for six weeks."

"Um!" The Housemaster endeavours to look severely judicial. "Young Binks is rather an exceptional boy," he observes. (Young Binks always is.) "Are you quite sure you _know_ him?"

The form-master, who has endured Master Binks' society for nearly two years, and knows him only too well, laughs caustically.

"Yes," he says, "I do know him: and I quite agree with you that he is rather an exceptional boy."

"Ah!" says the Housemaster, falling into the snare. "Then----"

"An exceptional young swab," explains the form-master.

By this time they have entered the Chapel, where they revert to their daily task of setting an example by howling one another down in the Psalms.

After Chapel the Housemaster takes the form-master aside and confides to him the intelligence that he has been a Housemaster for twenty-five years. The form-master, suppressing an obvious retort, endeavours to return to the question of Binks; but is compelled instead to listen to a brief homily upon the management of boys in general. As neither gentleman has breakfasted, the betting as to which will lose his temper first is almost even, with odds slightly in favour of the form-master, being the younger and hungrier man. However, it is quite certain that one of them will--probably both. The light of reason being thus temporarily obscured, they part, to meditate further repartees and complain bitterly of one another to their colleagues.

But it is very seldom that Master Binks profits by such Olympian differences as these. Possibly the Housemaster may decline to give the form-master permission to flog Binks, but in nine cases out of ten, being nothing if not conscientious, he flogs Binks himself, carefully explaining to the form-master afterwards, by implication only, that he has done so not from conviction, but from an earnest desire to bolster up the authority of an inexperienced and incompetent colleague. But these quibbles, as already observed, do not help the writhing Binks at all.

However, a Housemaster _contra mundum_, and a Housemaster in his own House, are very different beings. We have already seen that a bad Headmaster cannot always prevent a School from being good. But a House stands or falls entirely by its Housemaster. If he is a good Housemaster it is a good House: if not, nothing can save it. And therefore the responsibility of a Housemaster far exceeds that of a Head.

Consider. He is _in loco parentis_--with apologies to Stalky!--to some forty or fifty of the shyest and most reserved animals in the world; one and all animated by a single desire--namely, to prevent any fellow-creature from ascertaining what is at the back of their minds.

Schoolgirls, we are given to understand, are p.r.o.ne to open their hearts to one another, or to some favourite teacher, with luxurious abandonment. Not so boys. Up to a point they are frankness itself: beyond that point lie depths which can only be plumbed by instinct and intuition--qualities whose possession is the only test of a born Housemaster. All his flock must be an open book to him: he must understand both its collective and its individual tendencies. If a boy is inert and listless, the Housemaster must know whether his condition is due to natural sloth or some secret trouble, such as bullying or evil companionship. If a boy appears dour and dogged, the Housemaster has to decide whether he is shy or merely insolent. Private tastes and pet hobbies must also be borne in mind. The complete confidence of a hitherto unresponsive subject can often be won by a tactful reference to music or photography. The Housemaster must be able, too, to distinguish between brains and mere precocity, and to separate the fundamentally stupid boy from the lazy boy who is pretending to be stupid--an extremely common type. He must cultivate a keen nose for the malingerer, and at the same time keep a sharp look-out for fear lest the conscientious plodder should plod himself silly. He must discriminate between the whole-hearted enthusiast and the pretentious humbug who simulates keenness in order to curry favour. And above all, he must make allowances for heredity and home influence. Many a Housemaster has been able to adjust his perspective with regard to a boy by remembering that the boy has a drunken father, or a neurotic mother, or no parents at all.

He must keep a light hand on House politics, knowing everything, yet doing little, and saying almost nothing at all. If a Housemaster be blatantly autocratic; if he deputes power to no one; if he prides himself upon his iron discipline; if he quells mere noise with savage ferocity and screws down the safety-valve implacably upon healthy ragging, he will reap his reward. He will render his House quiet, obedient--and furtive. Under such circ.u.mstances prefects are a positive danger. Possessing special privileges, but no sense of responsibility, they regard their office merely as a convenient and exclusive avenue to misdemeanour.

On the other hand, a Housemaster must not allow his prefects unlimited authority, or he will cease to be master in his own House. In other words, he must strike an even balance between sovereign and deputed power--an undertaking which has sent dynasties toppling before now.

In addition to all this, he must be an Admirable Crichton. Whatever his own particular teaching subject may be, he will be expected, within the course of a single evening's "prep," to be able to unravel a knotty pa.s.sage in aeschylus, "unseen," solve a quadratic equation on sight, compose a chemical formula, or complete an elegiac couplet. He must also be prepared at any hour of the day or night to explain how leg-breaks are manufactured, recommend a list of novels for the House library, set a broken collar-bone, solve a jig-saw puzzle in the Sick-room, a.s.sist an Old Boy in the choice of a career, or prepare a candidate for Confirmation. And the marvel is that he always does it--in addition to his ordinary day's work in school.

And what is his remuneration? One of the rarest and most precious privileges that can be granted to an Englishman--the privilege of keeping a public house!

Let me explain. For the first twenty years of his professional career a schoolmaster works as a mere instructor of youth. By day he teaches his own particular subject; by night he looks over proses or corrects algebra papers. In his spare time he imparts private instruction to backward boys or scholarship candidates. Probably he bears a certain part in the supervision of the School games. He is possibly treasurer of one or two of the boys' own organisations--the Fives Club or the Debating Society--and as a rule he is permitted to fill up odd moments by sub-editing the School magazine or organising sing-songs. He cannot as a rule afford to marry; so he lives the best years of his life in two rooms, looking forward to the time, in the dim and hypothetical future, when he will possess what the ordinary artisan usually acquires on pa.s.sing out of his teens--a home of his own.

At length, after many days, provided that a sufficient number of colleagues die or get superannuated, comes his reward, and he enters upon the realisation of his dreams. He is now a Housemaster, with every opportunity (and full permission) to work himself to death.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE DAREDEVIL]

Still, you say, the labourer is worthy of his hire. A man occupying a position so onerous and responsible as this will be well remunerated.

What is his actual salary?

In many cases he receives no salary, as a Housemaster, at all. Instead, he is accorded the privilege of running his new home as a combined lodging-house and restaurant. His spare time (which the reader will have gathered is more than considerable) is now pleasantly occupied in purchasing beef and mutton and selling them to Binks tertius. As his tenure of the House seldom exceeds ten or fifteen years, he has to exercise considerable commercial enterprise in order to make a sufficient "pile" to retire upon--as Binks tertius sometimes discovers to his cost. In other words, a scholar and gentleman's reward for a life of unremitting labour in one of the most exacting yet altruistic fields in the world is a licence to enrich himself for a period of years by "cornering" the daily bread of the pupils in his charge. And yet we feel surprised, and hurt, and indignant, when foreigners suggest that we are a nation of shopkeepers.

The life of a Housemaster is a living example of the lengths to which the British pa.s.sion for undertaking heavy responsibilities and thankless tasks can be carried. Daily, hourly, he finds himself in contact (and occasional collision) with boys--boys for whose moral and physical welfare he is responsible; who in theory at least will regard him as their natural enemy; and who occupy the greater part of their leisure time in criticising and condemning him and everything that is his--his appearance, his character, his voice, his wife; the food that he provides and the raiment that he wears. He is harried by measles, mumps, servants, tradesmen, and parents. He feels constrained to invite every boy in his House to a meal at least once a term, which means that he is almost daily deprived of the true-born Briton's birthright of being uncommunicative at breakfast. His life is one long round of colourless routine, tempered by hair-bleaching emergencies.

But he loves it all. He maintains, and ultimately comes to believe, that his House is the only House in the School in which both justice and liberty prevail, and his boys the only boys in the world who know the meaning of hard work, good food, and _esprit de corps_. He pities all other Housemasters, and tells them so at frequent intervals; and he expostulates paternally and sorrowfully with form-masters who vilify the members of his cherished flock in half-term reports.