good-humoured and cheerful as possible, and all inspired by
a vague desire to improve the occasion.
The prizes were given away to the accompaniment of a rolling thunder
of applause; we had familiar and ingenuous recitations from youthful
orators, who desired friends, Romans, and countrymen to lend them their
ears, or accepted the atrocious accusation of being a young man;
and then a Bishop, who had been a schoolmaster himself, delivered an
address. It was delightful to see and hear the good man expatiate. I did
not believe much in what he said, nor could I reasonably endorse many
of his statements; but he did it all so genially and naturally that one
felt almost ashamed to question the matter of his discourse. Yet I could
not help wondering why it is thought advisable always to say exactly the
same things on these occasions. The good man began by asserting that
the boys would never be so happy or so important again in their lives as
they were at school, and that all grown-up people were envying them. I
don't know whether any one believed that; I am sure the boys did not,
if I can judge by what my own feelings used to be on such occasions.
Personally I used to think my school a very decent sort of place, but I
looked forward with excitement and interest to the liberty and life of
the larger world; and though perhaps in a way we elders envied the boys
for having the chances before them that we had so many of us neglected
to seize, I don't suppose that with the parable of Vice Versa before us
we would really have changed places with them. Would any one ever return
willingly to discipline and barrack-life? [Yes--ed.] Would any one under
discipline refuse independence if it were offered him on easy terms? I
doubt it!
Then the Bishop went on to talk about educational things; and he said
with much emphasis that in spite of all that was said about modern
education, we most of us realised as we grew older that all culture was
really based upon the Greek and Latin classics. We all stamped on the
ground and cheered at that, I as lustily as the rest, though I am quite
sure it is not true. All that the Bishop really meant was that such
culture as he himself possessed had been based on the classics. Now the
Bishop is a robust, genial, and sensible man, but he is not a strictly
cultured man. He is only sketchily varnished with culture. He thinks
that German literature is nebulous, and French literature immoral.
I don't suppose he
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